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^i 


THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES 


THE   NEW    HISTORY 


^^^ 


THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 

KKW  YORK    -    BOSTON    •    CHICAGO    •    DALLAS 
ATLANTA    •    SAN   FRANCISCO 

MACMILLAN  &  CO.,  Limited 

LONDON  •  BOMBAY  •  CALCUTTA 
MELBOURNE 

THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 
OF  CANADA,  Limited 

TORONTO 


THE  NEW  HISTORY 

ESSAYS   ILLUSTRATING  THE 

MODERN  HISTORICAL  OUTLOOK 


BV 

JAMES   HARVEY   ROBINSON 

PROFESSOR  OF  HISTORY  IN  COLUMBIA  UNIVERSITY 


THE   MACMILLAN   COMPANY 
193 1 


COPTEIGHT,    1912, 

By  the  MACMILLAN  COMPANY. 


All  rights  reserved  —  no  part  of  this 

book  may  be  reproduced  in  any  form 

without  permission  in  writing  from 

the  publisher. 


Set  up  and  electrotyped.    Published  March,  1913. 


ITottoooH  Press 

J.  S.  Gushing  Co.  —  Berwick  &  Smith  Co, 
Norwood,  Mass.,  U.S.A. 


Education 
Library 


PREFACE 

All  of  the  essays  in  this  volume,  with  the  exception 
of  the  fourth,  have  been  printed  before,  as  addresses 
or  contributions  to  periodicals.  They  have,  however, 
not  only  been  carefully  revised,  but  have  been  ad- 
justed so  as  to  give  as  much  coherence  as  possible 
to  the  collection.  They  all  illustrate,  each  in  its 
particular  way,  the  conception  of  "the  new  history" 
developed  in  the  first  essay. 

In  No.  I,  I  borrow  portions  from  an  article  on 
"Popular  Histories  and  their  Defects"  which  ap- 
peared in  the  now  defunct  International  Monthly, 
July,  1900,  but  have  made  a  new  use  of  them. 
The  second  paper  was  originally  prepared  as  one 
in  a  series  of  non-technical  lectures  deUvered  at 
Columbia  University  in  1908  and  pubHshed  by  the 
Columbia  University  Press.  With  it  has  been  com- 
bined portions  from  a  paper  on  "The  New  History" 
read  before  the  Philosophical  Society  in  Phila- 
delphia, April  22,  191 1.  No.  HI  was  read  before 
the  American  Historical  Association,  December,  19 10, 
and  printed  in  the  Journal  of  Philosophy,  Psychology, 
and  Scientific  Method,  March  16,  191 1,  where  No. 
VIII  also  appeared  on  May  11  of  the  same  year. 


855428 


Vi  PREFACE 

No.  V  was  read,  under  the  caption  "The  Significance 
of  History  in  Industrial  Education,"  before  the  super- 
intendents of  the  larger  cities  at  the  meeting  of  the 
National  Educational  Association  at  Indianapolis, 
March  2, 1910,  and  was  printed  in  The  Educational  Bi- 
Monthly,  June,  19 10.  No. VI  was  read  before  the  New 
England  Teachers  Association  at  Hartford,  April  27, 
1906.  No.  VII  is  a  combination  of  two  articles: 
"The  Tennis  Court  Oath,"  prepared  for  the  meeting 
of  the  American  Historical  Association  in  1894  and 
published  in  their  proceedings  and  in  the  Political 
Science  Quarterly,  Vol.  X,  No.  3,  and  "The  French 
Declaration  of  the  Rights  of  Man,"  which  was  printed 
in  the  latter  Journal,  Vol.  XIV,  No.  4;  together  with 
borrowings  from  an  article  in  the  American  Historical 
Review,  April,  1906,  on  "Some  Recent  Tendencies 
in  the  Study  of  the  French  Revolution." 

J.  H.  R. 

Columbia  University,  New  York, 
November,  1911. 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 

CHAPTBK  PAGB 

I.    The  New  History i 

II.    The  History  of  History 26 

III.  The  New  Allies  of  History    ....  70 

IV.  Some  Reflections  on  Intellectual  History  ioi 
V.    History  for  the  Common  Man         .        .        .  132 

VI.    "The  Fall  of  Rome" 154 

Vll.    "The  Principles  of  1789"         .        .        .        .195 
VIII.    The  Conservative  Spirit  in  the  Light  of 

History 236 


^"L 


THE    NEW   HISTORY 

In  its  amplest  meaning  History  includes  every  trace 
and  vestige  of  everything  that  man  has  done  or  thought 
since  first  he  appeared  on  the  earth.  It  may  aspire 
to  follow  the  fate  of  nations  or  it  may  depict  the  habits 
and  emotions  of  the  most  obscure  individual.  Its 
sources  of  information  extend  from  the  rude  flint 
hatchets  of  Chelles  to  this  morning's  newspaper.  It 
is  the  vague  and  comprehensive  science  of  past  human 
affairs.  We  are  within  its  bounds  whether  we  decipher 
a  mortgage  on  an  Assyrian  tile,  estimate  the  value  of 
the  Diamond  Necklace,  or  describe  the  over-short 
pastry  to  which  Charles  V  was  addicted  to  his  undoing. 
The  tragic  reflections  of  Eli's  daughter-in-law,  when 
she  learned  of  the  discomfiture  of  her  people  at  Eben- 
ezer,  are  history;  so  are  the  provisions  of  Magna 
Charta,  the  origin  of  the  doctrine  of  transubstantia- 
tion,  the  fall  of  Santiago,  the  difference  between  a 
black  friar  and  a  white  friar,  and  the  certified  circu- 
lation of  the  New  York  World  upon  February  i 
of  the  current  year.  Each  fact  has  its  interest 
and  importance ;  all  have  been  carefully  recorded. 

Now,  when  a  writer  opens  and  begins  to  peruse  the 
thick,  closely  written  volume  of  human  experience, 


3  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

with  a  view  of  making  an  abstract  of  it  for  those  who 
have  no  time  to  study  the  original  work,  he  is  imme- 
diately forced  to  ask  himself  what  he  shall  select 
to  present  to  his  readers'  attention.  He  finds  that 
the  great  book  from  which  he  gains  his  information  is 
grotesquely  out  of  perspective,  for  it  was  compiled 
by  many  different  hands,  and  by  those  widely  sepa- 
rated in  time  and  in  sentiment  —  by  Herodotus, 
Machiavelli,  Eusebius,  St.  Simon,  Otto  of  Freising, 
Pepys,  St.  Luke,  the  Duchess  of  Abrantes,  Sallust, 
Cotton  Mather.  The  portentously  serious  alternates 
with  the  lightest  gossip.  A  dissipated  courtier  may 
be  allotted  a  chapter  and  the  destruction  of  a  race 
be  left  unrecorded.  It  is  clear  that  in  treating  history 
for  the  general  reader  the  question  of  selection  and 
proportion  is  momentous.  Yet  when  we  turn  to  our 
more  popular  treatises  on  the  subject,  the  obvious 
and  pressing  need  of  picking  and  choosing,  of  selecting, 
reselecting,  and  selecting  again,  would  seem  to  have 
escaped  most  writers.  They  appear  to  be  the  victims 
of  tradition  in  dealing  with  the  past.  They  exhibit 
but  little  appreciation  of  the  vast  resources  upon 
which  they  might  draw,  and  unconsciously  follow,  for 
the  most  part,  an  estabhshed  routine  in  their  selection 
of  facts.  When  we  consider  the  vast  range  of  human 
interests,  our  histories  furnish  us  with  a  sadly  inade- 
quate and  misleading  review  of  the  past,  and  it 
might  almost  seem  as  if  historians  had  joined  in  a 
conspiracy  to  foster  a  narrow  and  relatively  unedi- 


THE  NEW  HISTORY 


3 


fying  conception  of  the  true  scope  and  intent  of  his- 
torical study.  This  is  apparent  if  we  examine  any  of 
the  older  standard  outlines  or  handbooks  from  which 
a  great  part  of  the  public  has  derived  its  notions  of 
the  past,  either  in  school  or  later  in  life. 

The  following  is  an  extract  from  a  compendium 
much  used  until  recently  in  schools  and  colleges : 
"Robert  the  Wise  (of  Anjou)  (1309-1343),  the  suc- 
cessor of  Charles  II  of  Naples,  and  the  champion  of 
the  Guelphs,  could  not  extend  his  power  over  Sicily 
where  Frederick  II  (i 296-1337),  the  son  of  Peter  of 
Aragon,  reigned.  Robert's  granddaughter,  Joan  I, 
after  a  career  of  crime  and  misfortune,  was  strangled 
in  prison  by  Charles  Durazzo,  the  last  male  descendant 
of  the  house  of  Anjou  in  Lower  Italy  (1382),  who 
seized  on  the  government.  Joan  II,  the  last  heir  of 
Durazzo  (1414-1435),  first  adopted  Alfonso  V,  of 
Aragon,  and  then  Louis  III,  of  Anjou,  and  his  brother, 
Ren6.  Alfonso,  who  inherited  the  crown  of  Sicily, 
imited  both  kingdoms  (1435),  after  a  war  with  Ren6 
and  the  Visconti  of  Milan." 

This  is  not,  as  we  might  be  tempted  to  suspect,  a 
mere  collection  of  data  for  contingent  reference,  no 
more  intended  to  be  read  than  a  table  of  logarithms. 
It  is  a  characteristic  passage  from  the  six  pages  which 
a  distinguished  scholar  devotes  to  the  Italy  of  Dante, 
Petrarch,  and  Lorenzo  the  Magnificent.  In  pre- 
paring a  guide  for  more  advanced  pupils  and  the 
general  reader,  the  author's  purpose  was,  he  tells  us, 


4  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

"that  it  should  present  the  essential  facts  of  his- 
tory in  due  order,  .  .  .  that  it  should  point  out  clearly 
the  connection  of  events  and  of  successive  eras  with  one 
another;  that  through  the  interest  awakened  by  the 
natural,  unforced  view  gained  of  this  imity  of  history 
and  by  such  illustrative  incidents  as  the  brevity  of  the 
narrative  would  allow  to  be  wrought  into  it,  the  dry- 
ness of  a  mere  summary  should  be  so  far  as  possible 
relieved."  Now,  in  treating  the  ItaHan  Renais- 
sance, this  writer  has  chosen  barely  to  mention  the 
name  of  Francesco  Petrarca,  but  devotes  a  twelfth 
of  the  available  space  to  the  interminable  dynastic 
squabbles  of  southern  Italy.  We  may  assume  that 
this  illustrates  his  conception  of  "the  essential  facts 
of  history  presented  in  due  order,"  for  the  extracts 
quoted  above  can  hardly  be  an  example  of  "illustra- 
tive incidents"  wrought  in  to  relieve  the  dryness  of  a 
mere  summary. 

I  open  a  more  recent  volume  which  treats  of  the 
whole  of  Europe  in  the  eighteenth  century,  as  it 
approached  the  momentous  crisis  of  the  French  Revo- 
lution. Its  author  could  hardly  fail  to  realize  the 
necessity  of  sifting  his  material  most  critically  in 
order  to  make  clear  the  regenerative  workings  of  the 
new  spirit  of  enlightenment  amid  conditions  essentially 
difficult  for  us  to  understand.  He  does  not  hesitate, 
however,  to  insert  such  statements  as  these:  "Zin- 
zendorf  died  in  1742,  Stahremberg  in  1745,  Kinsky  in 
1748.    While  Uhlfeld  became  on  Zinzendorf's  death 


THE  NEW  HISTORY  ^ 

nominally  chancellor,  Bartenstein  remained  from 
1740  to  1753  Minister  of  Foreign  Affairs,  and  had  the 
greatest  influence  in  the  secret  conference  of  Min- 
isters." Very  true;  but  were  there  not,  perhaps, 
other  things  better  worth  telling  about  an  ill-under- 
stood century  than  the  dates  of  the  deaths  of  the 
members  of  an  Austrian  cabinet  ? 

An  able  historian  of  the  French  Revolution,  who 
finds  no  time  to  tell  us  how  it  all  came  about,  cheer- 
fully devotes  many  paragraphs  to  matters  like  the 
following :  "The  bailliage  of  Aunis  claimed  to  be  inde- 
pendent of  Saintonge,  the  royal  bailliage  of  Nivernais 
asserted  that  it  included  the  ducal  bailliage,  and  the 
old  quarrel  between  Upper  and  Lower  Auvergne  again 
broke  out.  Similar  rivalry  appeared  between  the 
cities  of  Riom  and  Clermont-Ferrand,  each  claiming 
to  be  the  capital  of  the  bailliage  of  Lower  Auvergne, 
and  between  the  towns  of  Clermont-en-Argonne  and 
Varennes;  Chateauneuf-en-Thimerais  asserted  that 
it  was  a  royal  bailliage,  and  not  dependent  on 
Chartres." 

The  tendency  to  catalogue  mere  names  of  persons 
and  places  which  have  not  the  least  importance  for 
the  reader,  or  which  for  want  of  space  must  be  left 
as  undetermined  as  x,  y,  and  z  in  an  unsolved  equation, 
is  too  common  to  require  further  illustration.  The 
question  forces  itself  upon  us,  why  do  writers  include 
such  seemingly  irrelevant  and  unedifying  details? 
Sometimes,    doubtless,    from   mere    thoughtlessness; 


6  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

the  names  mean  something  to  the  writer,  who  mis- 
takenly infers  that  they  are  eloquent  in  themselves. 
Or  he  may  suppose  that  they  give  greater  vivacity 
to  his  tale,  or  will  form  the  nucleus  about  which  future 
knowledge  may  crystallize.  Names  but  once  men- 
tioned, however,  rarely  add  vividness  to  a  story, 
but  rather  obscure  it ;  and  it  is  safe  to  say  that  the 
mention  of  Durazzo,  Clermont-Ferrand,  Kinsky,  and 
Rene  are  little  likely  to  stimulate  farther  historical 
research,  but  rather  to  promote  general  obfuscation. 

It  is,  however,  often  urged  that  even  the  hastiest 
and  driest  chronicle  of  the  "  chief  events  "  in  the  world's 
history  is  a  good  thing,  —  that  we  get  at  least  a  chron- 
ological outline  which  we  carry  about  with  us  as  a 
guide,  which  enables  us  to  put  our  future  knowledge 
in  its  proper  relations.  We  learn  important  dates 
so  as  to  read  intelligently  later  of  events  of  which  in 
school  we  learn  only  the  names.  We  prepare  our- 
selves to  place  our  contingent  knowledge  of  literature, 
philosophy,  institutions,  and  art  in  what  is  called  an 
"historic  setting."  Many  of  us  have,  however,  come 
to  suspect  that  such  an  outline  amounts  to  very  little. 
It  recommends  itself,  it  is  true,  as  the  easiest  kind  of 
history  to  teach,  since  it  requires  no  thought,  —  only 
memory.  I  once  had  occasion  to  ask  a  college  pro- 
fessor of  great  erudition  and  culture,  who  had  resided 
several  years  in  the  Orient,  the  date  of  the  Hegira, 
which,  with  that  of  Marathon,  and  the  battle  of  Crecy, 
is  generally  regarded  as  part  of  the  equipment  of  every 


THE  NEW  HISTORY  7 

educated  gentleman.  He  did  not  know  the  date, 
however,  any  better  than  I  did,  so  we  looked  it  up 
in  a  dictionary.  We  might,  indeed,  have  saved  a 
minute  or  two  if  we  had  had  the  information  at  our 
tongue's  end,  but  we  had  never  missed  it  before. 

A  sensible  carpenter  or  plumber  does  not  constantly 
carry  a  saw  in  his  hip  pocket,  or  a  coil  of  lead  pipe 
over  his  shoulder,"  in  order  to  be  ready  for  a  distant 
emergency.  He  very  properly  goes  to  his  shop  and 
his  tool  chest  for  his  tools  and  materials.  No  more, 
in  these  days  of  cheap  and  convenient  books  of  ref- 
erence, need  the  student  of  history  go  heavy-armed 
for  intellectual  encounters.  Of  course  all  knowledge, 
even  that  which  is  well  forgotten,  may  beget  a  certain 
habit  of  accuracy  and  sense  of  proportion,  but  for- 
mulas should  follow  knowledge,  as  they  do  in  our  best 
mathematical  textbooks ;  in  historical  instruction  we 
have  ordinarily  given  our  formulas  first. 

The  really  fundamental  reason  for  hastening  to 
introduce  the  reader  as  early  as  possible  to  the  son  of 
Peter  of  Aragon,  to  Zinzendorf,  and  that  historic 
spot,  Chateauneuf-en-Thimerais,  has  doubtless  been 
the  venerable  predilection  for  merely  political  events 
and  persons  which  has  until  recently  dominated  our 
writers  of  popular  history.  Carlyle's  warning  has 
passed  unheeded,  that  far  away  from  senate  houses, 
battle  fields,  and  king's  antechambers,  "the  mighty 
tide  of  thought  and  action  was  still  rolling  on  its 
wondrous  course."    Elaborate  attempts  have  indeed 


8  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

been  made  to  justify  this  seemingly  disproportionate 
fondness  for  political  and  military  affairs.  We  are 
bluntly  told  by  Mr.  Freeman  that  "History  is  past 
politics."  To  Ranke  the  purpose  of  history  was  to 
clarify  our  notions  of  the  origin  and  nature  of  the 
State,  which  forms  the  basis  of  the  continuity  that 
we  believe  we  observe  in  human  development.  An- 
other German  scholar  claims  that  for  thousands  of 
years  the  State,  the  political  organism,  has  been  the 
chief  and  predominating  theme  of  historical  research 
and  that  it  should  remain  so.^ 

It  is  impossible  to  discuss  here  the  intricate  ques- 
tion of  the  role  of  the  State  in  the  past;  nor  is  it  neces- 
sary to  do  so,  for  no  one  denies  its  great  importance  or 
would  advocate  its  neglect  in  our  historical  manuals. 
The  real  question  is,  has  not  our  bias  for  political 
history  led  us  to  include  a  great  many  trifling  details 
of  dynasties  and  military  history  which  merely  con- 
found the  reader  and  take  up  precious  space  that 
should  be  devoted  to  certain  great  issues  hitherto 
neglected  ?  The  winning  or  losing  of  a  bit  of  terri- 
tory by  a  Louis  or  a  Frederick,  the  laborious  piecing 
together  of  a  puny  duchy  destined  to  speedy  disinte- 

^  A  bitter  war  was  waged  for  some  years  among  German  scholars 
over  the  question  of  the  proper  scope  of  history,  whether  the  State 
or  general  culture  is  its  proper  theme.  Professor  SchmoUer  denounces 
the  effort  to  assert  the  exclusive  claims  of  political  history  as  "jene 
Neigung  enger  bomierter  Geister,  die  ihre  Blossen  mit  Scheuklappen 
zudecken  um  einen  Rechstitel  fur  ihre  Unwissenheit  auf  den  Nach- 
bargebieten  zu  haben."  Jahrb.  f.  Gesetzgebung,  etc.,  Vol.  XIII,  p.  1484. 


THE  NEW  HISTORY  g 

gration  upon  the  downfall  of  a  Caesar  Borgia,  struggles 
between  rival  dynasties,  the  ambitions  of  young  kings' 
uncles,  the  turning  of  an  enemy's  flank  a  thousand 
years  ago,  —  have  not  such  things  been  given  an  un- 
merited prominence?  Man  is  more  than  a  warrior, 
a  subject,  or  a  princely  ruler ;  the  State  is  by  no  means 
his  sole  interest.  In  the  Middle  Ages  he  organized 
a  church  more  permanent,  more  penetratingly  power- 
ful, by  all  accounts,  than  any  civil  government  ever 
seen,  even  that  of  Rome  itself.  He  has,  through  the 
ages,  made  voyages,  extended  commerce,  founded 
cities,  established  great  universities,  written  books, 
built  glorious  cathedrals,  painted  pictures,  and  sought 
out  many  inventions.  The  propriety  of  including 
these  human  interests  in  our  historical  manuals  is 
being  more  and  more  widely  recognized,  but  political 
history  still  retains  its  supreme  position,  and  past  po- 
litical events  are  still  looked  upon  by  the  public  as 
history  par  excellence. 

In  contrast,  and  even  in  seeming  contradiction,  to 
the  tradition  which  gives  prominence  to  political 
events  and  personages,  there  is  a  curious  element 
of  the  sensational  in  our  popular  histories.  There 
is  a  kind  of  history  which  does  not  concern  itself  with 
the  normal  conduct  and  serious  achievements  of 
mankind  in  the  past,  but,  like  melodrama,  purposely 
selects  the  picturesque  and  lurid  as  its  theme. 
The  annals  of  France,  a  modern  writer  assures  us,  will 
always  command  special  attention,  for   "No  other 


lO  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

modem  nation  has  undergone  changes  more  frequent, 
more  radical,  more  sudden,  bloody,  and  dramatic." 
Then,  too:  "No  land  has  given  birth  to  men  more 
great,  more  good,  more  brave ;  none  has  been  cursed 
with  men  more  vile.  No  people  have  climbed  higher 
in  the  arduous  pathway  of  victory;  none  have  been 
so  pitilessly  stricken  down  in  defeat."  In  short, 
"France  has  furnished  the  epic  poem  of  modem 
history."  The  writer  would  therefore  convince  us 
that  the  more  prodigious  the  occurrences  narrated, 
the  better  the  history.  A  distinguished  chemist  once 
considerately  told  me  that  it  seemed  to  him  that  the 
certitude  of  history  varied  in  inverse  ratio  to  what 
we  know  about  it.  He  might  have  added  that  some- 
times, in  common  with  the  Police  Gazette,  its  intrin- 
sic interest  appears  to  vary  in  direct  ratio  to  its  grue- 
someness. 

There  would  be  less  objection  to  perpetuating  the 
conception  of  history  as  a  chronicle  of  heroic  persons 
and  romantic  occurrences,  were  it  not  that  the  craving 
for  the  dramatic  can  be  better  met  by  confessed  fiction, 
and  that  those  who  see  in  history  an  epic  poem  give 
us  very  imperfect  and  erroneous  notions  of  the  past. 
In  no  other  subject  of  study  except  history,  is  fortui- 
tous prominence  accepted  as  a  measure  of  importance. 
The  teacher  of  chemistry  does  not  confine  himself 
to  pretty  experiments,  but  conscientiously  chooses 
those  that  are  most  typical  and  instructive.  Metallic 
potassiimi  and  liquefied  air  are  less  common  in  the 


THE  NEW  HISTORY  XX 

laboratory  than  water,  lime,  and  sulphuric  add.  What 
would  be  the  opinion  in  regard  to  a  clinical  lecturer 
who  dwelt  upon  leprosy  and  the  bubonic  plague  for 
fear  his  students  might  be  bored  by  a  description  of 
the  symptoms  of  measles  and  typhoid?  In  every 
study  except  history  the  teacher  seeks  to  make  the 
important  and  normal  clear  at  any  cost.  All  his 
expedients  are  directed  to  that  one  end.  The  rule, 
not  the  exception,  is  his  object. 

It  is  noteworthy,  too,  that  we  generally  recognize 
the  misleading  character  of  descriptions  of  contem- 
poraneous conditions  in  which  only  the  sensational 
events  are  narrated.  Romantic  marriages  and  tragic 
deaths;  the  doings  of  poisoners,  adulterers,  and 
lunatics;  the  cases  of  those  who  have  swallowed 
needles  to  find  them  coming  out  at  unexpected  places 
years  after;  who  have  taken  laudanum  for  pare- 
goric, or  been  run  over  by  beer  wagons;  even  the 
fullest  account  of  such  matters  furnishes,  after  all,  but 
a  partial  picture  of  the  life  of  a  great  city  to-day.  Yet 
in  the  history  of  France  alluded  to  above,  the  descrip- 
tion of  the  feudal  system  scarcely  extends  beyond  dun- 
geons,— "  Oh  how  damp,  dark,  and  cold! " — knee  clamps 
and  thumbscrews.  The  medieval  church  was,  we  might 
infer,  httle  more  than  the  clever  device  of  evil  men 
to  gratify  greed  and  lasciviousness,  and  abounded  in 
"humbugs,  frauds,  and  bogus  miracles."  To  make 
true  statements  is  not  necessarily  to  tell  the  truth. 
We  may,  like  the  "yellow"  journalist,  narrate  facts, 


12  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

but  with  such  reckless  disregard  of  perspective,  and 
with  such  a  consistent  anxiety  to  startle  the  reader, 
that  unvarnished  fiction  would  be  preferable.  A 
writer  who,  instead  of  endeavoring  to  make  plain  the 
true  greatness  of  the  church,  says,  "Miraculous  oil 
was  common,  portions  of  the  true  cross  plentiful, 
and  such  objects  as  St.  Anne's  comb  and  the  Virgin 
Mary's  petticoat  were  accessible  to  the  devout,'' 
is  guilty  of  gross  misrepresentation  within  the  bounds 
of  formal  accuracy. 

The  partiality  exhibited  by  our  popular  writers  for 
certain  classes  of  historical  facts  is  obviously  no  proof 
that  other  and  more  pertinent  facts  should  not  be 
brought  to  the  reader's  attention.  For  it  may  be,  as 
we  have  seen,  either  that  events  are  narrated  simply 
because  they  are  pleasing,  or  dramatic,  or  highly  excep- 
tional; or  that  they  are  mentioned  because  it  is 
deemed  proper  that  an  educated  man  should  know  that 
PhiUp  Augustus  became  king  in  1180,  and  that  the 
Battle  of  the  Boyne  was  fought  in  1690.  But  a 
writer  who  is  governed  by  these  motives  in  his  selec- 
tion of  material  will  naturally  produce  a  book  in  which 
famous  episodes  and  mildly  diverting  anecdotes  are 
given  a  didactic  seriousness  by  a  proper  admixture  of 
dry,  traditional  information. 

We  are,  further,  ordinarily  taught  to  view  mankind 
as  in  a  periodic  state  of  turmoil.  Historical  writers 
do  all  they  can,  by  studied  neglect,  to  disguise  the  im- 
portance of  the  lucid   intervals  during  which  the 


THE  NEW  HISTORY  13 

greater  part  of  human  progress  has  taken  place. 
They  skip  lightly  from  one  commotion  to  another. 
They  have  not  time  to  explain  what  the  French  Revo- 
lution was  by  rationally  describing  the  Ancien  regime, 
which  can  alone  give  it  any  meaning,  but  after  the 
quotation  from  La  Bruyere,  regarding  certain  fierce 
animals,  "black,  Hvid,  and  burnt  by  the  sun,"  and  a 
repetition  of  that" careless  phrase,  "After  us,  the  del- 
uge," they  hasten  on  to  the  Reign  of  Terror  as  the  be- 
all  and  end-all  of  the  bloody  affair.  And  in  this  way 
they  make  a  second  St.  Bartholomew's  of  one  of  the 
grandest  and,  in  its  essential  reforms,  most  peaceful  of 
changes  which  ever  overtook  France  or  Europe.  Ob- 
viously the  real  significance  of  a  revolution  is  to  be 
measured  by  the  extent  to  which  general  conditions 
were  changed  and  new  things  substituted  for  the  old. 
The  old  must,  therefore,  be  studied  quite  as  carefully 
as  the  new  —  more  carefully,  indeed,  since  our  sym- 
pathies are  usually  with  the  new,  and  our  knowledge  of 
the  more  recent  is  fuller  than  that  of  the  more  remote. 
Hence,  we  might  far  better  busy  ourselves  with  the 
reasons  why  arbitrary  imprisonments,  the  guilds,  the 
sale  of  offices,  and  so  forth,  were  defended  by  many 
thoughtful,  well-intentioned  citizens  than  waste  time 
in  a  gratuitous  denunciation  of  them. 

I  know  that  at  this  point  the  perfectly  natural  ob- 
jection may  be  raised,  that  while  institutions  and  grad- 
ual developments  may  be  very  legitimate  objects  of 
study  for  those  already  trained  in  historical  work, 


14  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

they  are  not  proper  subjects  for  any  one  except  a 
university  student  or  an  occasional  serious-minded 
and  long-suffering  general  reader.  Only  conspicuous 
events  and  striking  crises  are,  it  is  ordinarily  assumed, 
within  the  scope  of  natural  himian  interest,  and  the 
influence  of  the  personal  element  must,  it  is  urged, 
be  exaggerated,  simply  because  the  general  trend  of 
development  and  progress  offers  nothing  which  the 
mind  can  easily  grasp.  We  therefore  substitute  for 
the  real  historical  continuity  a  factitious  continuity 
and  string  our  narrative  upon  a  line  of  kings  —  Magnus 
VI  (1263-1281),  followed  by  Erick  II  (1281-1299), 
followed  by  Hakon  V  (1299-13  20),  followed  by  Mag- 
nus VII  (13 20-1365).  No  one  will  deny,  however, 
that  most  of  the  names  in  even  the  best-known  dynas- 
ties remain  mere  names;  and  even  if  we  learn  that 
Emperor  Rudolph  II  was  a  learned  man  and  an 
astrologer,  and  his  contemporary,  Henry  III  of 
France,  "a  debauched  weakling,"  this  knowledge  in  no 
way  aids  us  in  grasping  the  most  fundamental  and 
valuable  truth  which  the  past  has  to  teach  us,  that  of 
historical  continuity. 

Those  therefore  who  would  view  with  distrust  any 
attempt  radically  to  alter  our  current  methods  of 
presenting  general  history,  would  probably  withdraw 
their  opposition  to  a  change,  if  some  scheme  could  be 
devised  by  which  conditions  and  institutions  could  be 
made  interesting  and  comprehensible,  and  a  real  con- 
tinuity be  substituted  for  the  kingly  nexus  with  which 


THE  NEW  fflSTORY  15 

we  now  bind  the  past  together.  Now  I  firmly  believe 
that  "institutions"  (which  are  after  all  only  national 
habits)  can  be  made  interesting.  I  use  the  word  "in- 
stitutions" in  a  very  broad  sense  to  include  the  ways 
in  which  people  have  thought  and  acted  in  the  past, 
their  tastes  and  their  achievements  in  many  fields 
besides  the  political.  Events  are  the  more  or  less 
clear  expression  of  "institutions"  in  this  sense,  and  the 
events  properly  selected  will  serve  to  make  the  "in- 
stitutions" clear. 

Hitherto  writers  have  been  prone  to  deal  with  events 
for  their  own  sake ;  a  deeper  insight  will  surely  lead  us, 
as  time  goes  on,  to  reject  the  anomalous  and  seemingly 
accidental  occurrences  and  dwell  rather  upon  those 
which  illustrate  some  profound  historical  truth.  And 
there  is  a  very  simple  principle  by  which  the  relevant 
and  useful  may  be  determined  and  the  irrelevant  re- 
jected. Is  the  fact  or  occurrence  one  which  will  aid 
the  reader  to  grasp  the  meaning  of  any  great  period  of 
human  development  or  the  true  nature  of  any  momen- 
tous institution?  It  should  then  be  cherished  as  a 
precious  means  to  an  end,  and  the  more  engaging  it  is, 
the  better;  its  inherent  interest  will  only  facilitate 
our  work,  not  embarrass  it.  On  the  other  hand,  is 
an  event  seemingly  fortuitous,  isolated,  and  anoma- 
lous, —  like  the  story  of  Rienzi,  the  September  mas- 
sacres, or  the  murder  of  Marat  ?  We  should  then  hesi- 
tate to  include  it  on  its  own  merits,  —  at  least  in  a 
brief  historical  manual  —  for,  interesting  as  it  may  be 


l6  THE  NEW  fflSTORY 

as  an  heroic  or  terrible  incident,  it  may  mislead  the 
reader  and  divert  his  attention  from  the  prevailing 
interests,  preoccupations  and  permanent  achievements 
of  the  past. 

If  we  have  not  been  unfair  in  our  review  of  the  more 
striking  peculiarities  of  popular  historiography,  we 
find  them  to  be  as  follows :  — 

(i)  A  careless  inclusion  of  mere  names,  which  can 
scarcely  have  any  meaning  for  the  reader  and  which, 
instead  of  stimulating  thought  and  interest,  merely 
weigh  down  his  spirit. 

(2)  A  penchant  more  or  less  irresistible  to  recite 
political  events  to  the  exclusion  of  other  matters 
often  of  far  greater  moment. 

(3)  The  old  habit  of  narrating  extraordinary  epi- 
sodes, not  because  they  illustrate  the  general  trend  of 
affairs  or  the  prevaihng  conditions  of  a  particular  time, 
but  simply  because  they  are  conspicuous  in  the  annals 
of  the  past.  This  results  in  a  ludicrous  disregard  of 
perspective  which  assigns  more  importance  to  a  de- 
mented journalist  like  Marat  than  to  so  influential  a 
writer  as  Erasmus. 

n 

The  essay  which  immediately  follows  this  will  be 
devoted  to  a  sketch  of  the  history  of  history,  and  will 
explain  more  fully  the  development  of  the  older  ideals 
of  historical  composition.     It  will  make  clear  that  these 


THE  NEW  fflSTORY  1 7 

ideals  have  changed  so  much  from  time  to  time  that  it 
is  quite  possible  that  an  essentially  new  one  may  in 
time  prevail.     History  is  doubtless 

An  orchard  bearing  several  trees 
And  fnuts  of  different  tastes. 

It  may  please  our  fancy,  gratify  our  serious  or  idle 
curiosity,  test  our  memories,  and,  as  Bolingbroke  says, 
contribute  to  "  a  creditable  kind  of  ignorance."  But 
the  one  thing  that  it  ought  to  do,  and  has  not  yet  effec- 
tively done,  is  to  help  us  to  understand  ourselves  and 
our  fellows  and  the  problems  and  prospects  of  man- 
kind. It  is  this  most  significant  form  of  history's 
usefulness  that  has  been  most  commonly  neglected. 

It  is  true  that  it  has  long  been  held  that  certain 
lessons  could  be  derived  from  the  past,  —  precedents 
for  the  statesman  and  the  warrior,  moral  guidance  and 
consoling  instances  of  providential  interference  for 
the  commonalty.  But  there  is  a  growing  suspicion, 
which  has  reached  conviction  in  the  minds  of  most 
modem  historians,  that  this  type  of  usefulness  is  purely 
illusory.  The  present  writer  is  anxious  to  avoid  any 
risk  of  being  regarded  as  an  advocate  of  these  sup- 
posed advantages  of  historical  study.  Their  value 
rests  on  the  assumption  that  conditions  remain  suffi- 
ciently uniform  to  give  precedents  a  perpetual  value, 
while,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  conditions,  at  least  in  our 
own  time,  are  so  rapidly  altering  that  for  the  most  part 
it  would  be  dangerous  indeed  to  attempt  to  apply 


l8  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

past  experience  to  the  solution  of  current  problems. 
Moreover,  we  rarely  have  suflSicient  reliable  informa- 
tion in  regard  to  the  supposed  analogous  situation  in 
the  past  to  enable  us  to  apply  it  to  present  needs. 
Most  of  the  appeals  of  inexpensive  oratory  to  "what  his- 
tory teaches"  belong  to  this  class  of  assumed  analogies 
which  will  not  bear  close  scrutiny.  When  I  speak  of 
history  enabling  us  to  understand  ourselves  and  the 
problems  and  prospects  of  mankind,  I  have  something 
quite  different  in  mind,  which  I  will  try  to  make  plain 
by  calling  the  reader's  attention  to  the  use  that  he 
makes  of  his  own  personal  history. 

We  are  almost  entirely  dependent  upon  our  mem- 
ory of  our  past  thoughts  and  experiences  for  an  under- 
standing of  the  situation  in  which  we  find  ourselves  at 
any  given  moment.  To  take  the  nearest  example,  the 
reader  will  have  to  consult  his  own  history  to  under- 
stand why  his  eyes  are  fixed  upon  this  particular  page. 
If  he  should  fall  into  a  sound  sleep  and  be  suddenly 
awakened,  his  memory  might  for  the  moment  be 
paralyzed,  and  he  would  gaze  in  astonishment  about 
the  room,  with  no  realization  of  his  whereabouts. 
The  fact  that  all  the  familiar  objects  about  him  pre- 
sented themselves  plainly  to  his  view  would  not  be 
suflEicient  to  make  him  feel  at  home  until  his  memory 
had  come  to  his  aid  and  enabled  him  to  recall  a  cer- 
tain portion  of  the  past.  The  momentary  suspension 
of  memory's  functions  as  one  recovers  from  a  faint- 
ing fit  or  emerges  from  the  effects  of  an  anaesthetic 


THE  NEW  HISTORY  I9 

is  sometimes  so  distressing  as  to  amount  to  a 
sort  of  intellectual  agony.  In  its  nonnal  state  the 
mind  selects  automatically,  from  the  almost  infinite 
mass  of  memories,  just  those  things  in  our  past 
which  make  us  feel  at  home  in  the  present.  It 
works  so  easily  and  eflSciently  that  we  are  unconscious 
of  what  it  is  doing  for  us  and  of  how  dependent  we 
are  upon  it.  It  supplies  so  promptly  and  so  precisely 
what  we  need  from  the  past  in  order  to  make  the 
present  intelligible  that  we  are  beguiled  into  the  mis- 
taken notion  that  the  present  is  self-explanatory  and 
quite  able  to  take  care  of  itself,  and  that  the  past  is 
largely  dead  and  irrelevant,  except  when  we  have  to 
make  a  conscious  effort  to  recall  some  elusive  fact. 

What  we  call  history  is  not  so  different  from  our 
more  intimate  personal  memories  as  at  first  sight  it 
seems  to  be ;  for  very  many  of  the  useful  and  essential 
elements  in  our  recollections  are  not  personal  experi- 
ences at  all,  but  include  a  multitude  of  things  which  we 
have  been  told  or  have  read ;  and  these  play  a  very 
important  part  in  our  life.  Should  the  reader  of  this 
page  stop  to  reflect,  he  would  perceive  a  long  succession 
of  historical  antecedents  leading  up  to  his  presence  in  a 
particular  room,  his  ability  to  read  the  English  lan- 
guage, his  momentary  freedom  from  pressing  cares,  and 
his  inclination  to  center  his  attention  upon  a  discus- 
sion of  the  nature  and  value  of  historical  study.  Were 
he  not  vaguely  conscious  of  these  historical  antece- 
dents, he  would  be  in  the  bewildered  condition  spoken 


20  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

of  above.  Some  of  the  memories  necessary  to  save 
him  from  his  bewdlderment  are  parts  of  his  own  past 
experience,  but  many  of  them  belong  to  the  realm  of 
history,  namely,  to  what  he  has  been  told  or  what  he 
has  read  of  the  past. 

I  could  have  no  hope  that  this  line  of  argument 
would  make  the  slightest  impression  upon  the  reader, 
were  he  confined  either  to  the  immediate  impressions  of 
the  moment,  or  to  his  personal  experiences.  It  gives 
one  something  of  a  shock,  indeed,  to  consider  what  a 
very  small  part  of  our  guiding  convictions  are  in  any 
way  connected  with  our  personal  experience.  The 
date  of  our  own  birth  is  quite  as  strictly  historical  a 
fact  as  that  of  Artaphemes  or  of  Innocent  III ;  we  are 
forced  to  a  helpless  reliance  upon  the  evidence  of 
others  for  both  events. 

So  it  comes  about  that  our  personal  recollections 
insensibly  merge  into  history  in  the  ordinary  sense  of 
the  word.  History,  from  this  point  of  view,  may  be 
regarded  as  an  artificial  extension  and  broadening  of 
our  memories  and  may  be  used  to  overcome  the  natural 
bewilderment  of  all  unfamiliar  situations.  Could  we 
suddenly  be  endowed  with  a  Godlike  and  exhaustive 
knowledge  of  the  whole  history  of  mankind,  far  more 
complete  than  the  combined  knowledge  of  all  the  his- 
tories ever  written,  we  should  gain  forthwith  a  God- 
like appreciation  of  the  world  in  which  we  live,  and  a 
Godlike  insight  into  the  evils  which  mankind  now  suf- 
fers, as  well  as  into  the  most  promising  methods  for  alle- 


THE  NEW  HISTORY  21 

viating  them,  not  because  the  past  would  furnish  prece- 
dents of  conduct,  but  because  our  conduct  would  be  based 
upon  a  perfect  comprehension  of  existing  conditions 
founded  upon  a  perfect  knowledge  of  the  past.    As  yet  we 
are  not  in  a  position  to  interrogate  the  past  with  a  view 
to  gaining  hght  on  great  social,  political,  economic, 
religious,  and  educational  questions  in  the  manner  in 
which  we  settle  the  personal  problems  which  face  us  — 
for  example,  whether  we  should  make  such  and  such  a 
visit  or  investment,  or  read  such  and  such  a  book,  —  by 
unconsciously  judging  the  situation  in  the  light  of  our 
recollections.     Historians  have  not  as  yet  set  them- 
selves to  furnish  us  with  what  lies  behind  our  great 
contemporaneous  task  of  human  betterment.     They 
have  hitherto  had  other  notions  of  their  functions,  and 
were  they  asked  to  furnish  answers  to  the  questions  that 
a  person  au  courant  with  the  problems  of  the  day  would 
most  naturally  put  to  them,  they  would  with  one  ac- 
cord begin  to  make  excuses.     One  would  say  that  it 
had  long  been  recognized  that  it  was  the  historian's 
business  to  deal  with  kings,  parhaments,  constitutions, 
wars,  treaties,  and  territorial  changes ;  another  would 
declare   that   recent   history   cannot   be   adequately 
written  and  that,  therefore,  we  can  never  hope  to 
bring  the  past  into  relation  with  the  present,  but  must 
always  leave  a  fitting  interval  between  ourselves  and 
the  nearest  point  to  which  the  historian  should  venture 
to  extend  his  researches  ;  a  third  will  urge  that  to  have 
a  purpose  in  historical  study  is  to  endanger  those  prin- 


22  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

ciples  of  objectivity  upon  which  all  sound  and  scien- 
tific research  must  be  based.  So  it  comes  about  that 
our  books  are  like  very  bad  memories  which  insist 
upon  recalling  facts  that  have  no  assignable  relation 
to  our  needs,  and  this  is  the  reason  why  the  practical 
value  of  history  has  so  long  been  obscured. 

In  order  to  make  still  clearer  our  dependence  upon 
history  in  dealing  with  the  present,  let  the  reader 
remember  that  we  owe  most  of  our  institutions  to 
a  rather  remote  past,  which  alone  can  explain  their 
origin.  The  conditions  which  produced  the  Holy 
Roman  Apostolic  Church,  trial  by  jury,  the  Privy 
Council,  the  degree  of  LL.D.,  the  Book  of  Common 
Prayer,  "the  Uberal  arts,"  were  very  different  from 
those  that  exist  to-day.  Contemporaneous  religious, 
educational,  and  legal  ideals  are  not  the  immediate 
product  of  existing  circumstances,  but  were  developed 
in  great  part  during  periods  when  man  knew  far  less 
than  he  now  does.  Curiously  enough  our  habits  of 
thought  change  much  more  slowly  than  our  environ- 
ment and  are  usually  far  in  arrears.  Our  respect  for 
a  given  institution  or  social  convention  may  be  purely 
traditional  and  have  Httle  relation  to  its  value,  as 
judged  by  existing  conditions.  We  are,  therefore,  in 
constant  danger  of  viewing  present  problems  with  ob- 
solete emotions  and  of  attempting  to  settle  them  by 
obsolete  reasoning.  This  is  one  of  the  chief  reasons 
why  we  are  never  by  any  means  perfectly  adjusted  to 
our  environment. 


THE  NEW  fflSTORY  23 

Our  notions  of  a  church  and  its  proper  function  in 
society,  of  a  capitalist,  of  a  liberal  education,  of  paying 
taxes,  of  Sunday  observance,  of  poverty,  of  war,  are  de- 
termined only  to  a  slight  extent  by  what  is  happening 
to-day.  The  belief  on  which  I  was  reared,  that  God 
ordained  the  observance  of  Sunday  from  the  clouds  of 
Sinai,  is  an  anachronism  which  could  not  spontane- 
ously have  developed  in  the  United  States  in  the 
nineteenth  century ;  nevertheless,  it  still  continues  to 
influence  the  conduct  of  many  persons.  We  pay  our 
taxes  as  grudgingly  as  if  they  were  still  the  extortions 
of  feudal  barons  or  absolute  monarchs  for  their  per- 
sonal gratification,  although  they  are  now  a  contribu- 
tion to  our  common  expenses  fixed  by  our  own  rep- 
resentatives. Few  have  outgrown  the  emotions  con- 
nected with  war  at  a  time  when  personal  prowess  played 
a  much  greater  part  than  the  Steel  Trust.  Conserva- 
tive college  presidents  still  feel  obhged  to  defend  the 
"liberal  arts"  and  the  "humanities"  without  any 
very  clear  imderstanding  of  how  the  task  came  to  be 
imposed  upon  them.  To  do  justice  to  the  anachro- 
nisms in  conservative  economic  and  legal  reasoning 
would  require  a  whole  volume. 

Society  is  to-day  engaged  in  a  tremendous  and  un- 
precedented effort  to  better  itself  in  manifold  ways. 
Never  has  our  knowledge  of  the  world  and  of  man  been 
so  great  as  it  now  is ;  never  before  has  there  been  so 
much  general  good  will  and  so  much  intelligent  social 
activity  as  now  prevails.    The  part  that  each  of  us 


24  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

can  play  in  forwarding  some  phase  of  this  reform  will 
depend  upon  our  understanding  of  existing  conditions 
and  opinion,  and  these  can  only  be  explained,  as  has 
been  shown,  by  following  more  or  less  carefully  the 
processes  that  produced  them.  We  must  develop  his- 
torical-mindedness  upon  a  far  more  generous  scale 
than  hitherto,  for  this  will  add  a  still  deficient  element 
in  our  intellectual  equipment  and  will  promote  ra- 
tional progress  as  nothing  else  can  do.  The  present 
has  hitherto  been  the  willing  victim  of  the  past; 
the  time  has  now  come  when  it  should  turn  on  the 
past  and  exploit  it  in  the  interests  of  advance. 

The  "New  History"  is  escaping  from  the  limitations 
formerly  imposed  upon  the  study  of  the  past.  It  will 
come  in  time  consciously  to  meet  our  daily  needs ;  it 
will  avail  itself  of  all  those  discoveries  that  are  being 
made  about  mankind  by  anthropologists,  economists, 
psychologists,  and  sociologists  —  discoveries  which 
during  the  past  fifty  years  have  served  to  revolution- 
ize our  ideas  of  the  origin,  progress,  and  prospects  of 
our  race.  There  is  no  branch  of  organic  or  inorganic 
science  which  has  not  undergone  the  most  remarkable 
changes  during  the  last  half  century,  and  many  new 
branches  of  social  science,  even  the  names  of  which 
would  have  been  unknown  to  historians  in  the 
middle  of  the  nineteenth  century,  have  been  added  to 
the  long  list.  It  is  inevitable  that  history  should  be 
involved  in  this  revolutionary  process,  but  since  it 
must  be  confessed  that  this  necessity  has  escaped  many 


THE  NEW  HISTORY 


25 


contemporaneous  writers,  it  is  no  wonder  that  the  in- 
telligent public  continues  to  accept  somewhat  archaic 
ideas  of  the  scope  and  character  of  history. 

The  title  of  this  Uttle  volume  has  been  chosen  with 
the  view  of  emphasizing  the  fact  that  history  should 
not  be  regarded  as  a  stationary  subject  which  can  only 
progress  by  refining  its  methods  and  accumulating, 
criticizing,  and  assihiilating  new  material,  but  that  it  is 
bound  to  alter  its  ideals  and  aims  with  the  general 
progress  of  society  and  of  the  social  sciences,  and  that 
it  should  ultimately  play  an  infinitely  more  important 
r61e  in  our  intellectual  life  than  it  has  hitherto  done. 


THE  HISTORY  OF  HISTORY 

"History"  is  so  vague  a  term  at  best,  and  has  dur- 
ing the  past  twenty-five  hundred  years  undergone  such 
considerable  changes  in  character  and  purpose,  that 
it  is  well  for  one  to  review  its  somewhat  startling 
vicissitudes  if  he  desires  to  understand  the  conflicting 
notions  which  prevail  to-day  in  regard  to  the  signifi- 
cance of  the  past  and  the  proper  way  of  dealing  with 
it.  When  we  look  back  over  the  history  of  history, 
from  Hecataeus  of  Miletus  and  Herodotus  to  the 
freshest  doctor's  dissertation,  we  perceive  that  its 
point  of  view  has  never  been  a  settled  one;  that  it 
has  been  the  victim  at  once  of  routine  and  of  tran- 
sient circumstances.  Some  of  its  former  ambitions 
it  has  now  been  forced  to  surrender;  it  has  been 
chastened  by  a  growing  consciousness  of  ignorance; 
but  these  humiliations  have  been  far  more  than  offset 
by  the  extraordinary  extension  of  its  domain,  which 
has  taken  place  very  recently  and  almost  insensibly. 
Half  a  century  ago,  man's  past  was  supposed  to  in- 
clude less  than  six  thousand  years ;  now  the  story  is 
seen  to  stretch  back  hundreds  of  thousands  of  years. 
But  it  is  not  man  alone  that  has  a  history,  —  animals, 
plants,  rocks,  stars,  even  atoms,  have  theirs  as  well. 
So  the  zoologist,  the  botanist,  the  geologist,  the  as- 

26 


THE  HISTORY  OF  HISTORY  37 

tronomer,  even  the  chemist  have  come  to  worship  at 
History's  shrine. 

The  growth  of  historical-mindedness  is  thus  perhaps 
the  chief  intellectual  trait  of  our  age.  It  is  deeply 
affecting  not  only  the  social  sciences  but  our  general 
conceptions  of  the  whole  organic  and  inorganic  world. 
Yet  in  its  beginnings  history  had  no  very  serious  aims. 
It  was  doubtless  discovered,  in  the  first  instance,  by 
the  story- teller,  and  its  purpose  has  usually  been  to 
tell  a  tale  rather  than  to  contribute  to  a  well-con- 
sidered body  of  scientific  knowledge.  Indeed  we 
shall  not  be  far  astray,  if  we  view  history,  as  it 
has  existed  through  the  ages,  and  even  down  to 
our  own  day,  as  a  branch  of  general  literature,  the 
object  of  which  has  been  to  present  past  events  in  an 
artistic  manner,  in  order  to  gratify  a  natural  curiosity 
in  regard  to  the  achievements  and  fate  of  conspicuous 
persons,  the  rise  and  decay  of  monarchies,  and  the 
signal  commotions  and  disasters  which  have  repeat- 
edly aflElicted  humanity. 

Although  the  persistence  of  this  primitive  notion  of 
history  is  so  obvious  as  scarcely  to  demand  illustration, 
it  is  interesting  to  note  that  as  late  as  1820,  Daunou,  a 
reputable  French  historian  of  his  time,  in  a  course  of 
lectures  upon  the  pursuit  of  history  delivered  at  the 
College  de  France,  declares  that  the  masterpieces  of 
epic  poetry  should  claim  the  first  attention  of  the 
would-be  historian,  since  it  is  the  ix)ets  who  have 
created  the  art  of  narrative.    Then,  from  the  modem 


38  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

novel,  Daunou  continues,  the  student  may  learn  "the 
method  of  giving  an  artistic  pose  to  persons  and  events, 
of  distributing  details,  of  skillfully  carrying  on  the 
thread  of  the  narrative,  of  interrupting  it,  of  resuming 
it,  of  sustaining  the  attention  and  provoking  the  curios- 
ity of  the  reader."  After  the  poets  and  novelists,  the 
works  of  standard  historians  should  be  read  with  a 
view  to  surprising  the  secrets  of  their  style  —  Herodo- 
tus, Thucydides,  Xenophon,  Polybius,  and  Plutarch ; 
Caesar,  Sallust,  Livy,  and  Tacitus;  and,  among  the 
moderns,  Macchiavelli,  Guicciardini,  Giannone,  Hume, 
Robertson,  Gibbon,  and  Voltaire.  When  the  founda- 
tions of  an  elegant  literary  style  are  firmly  established, 
the  student  may  re-read  the  standard  treatises  with 
attention  to  the  matter  rather  than  the  form;  for,  as 
even  the  judicious  Daunou  concedes,  before  writing 
history  "it  is  evidently  necessary  to  know  it."  Both 
Daunou's  program  and  his  list  of  names  —  unques- 
tionably the  most  distinguished  among  historians 
throughout  the  centuries  —  testify  to  the  strength 
of  literary  traditions  among  historical  writers. 

Yet  a  formal  distinction  at  least  has  of  course  al- 
ways been  made  between  history  and  other  branches  of 
Hterature.  This  is  emphasized  by  Polybius,  writing 
in  the  second  century  before  Christ.  "Surely,"  he 
says,  "an  historian's  object  should  be  not  to  amaze  his 
readers  by  a  series  of  thrilling  anecdotes,  nor  should  he 
aim  to  produce  speeches  which  might  have  been  de- 
livered, nor  to  study  dramatic  propriety  in  detail,  like  a 


THE  HISTORY  OF  HISTORY  99 

writer  of  tragedy.  On  the  contrary,  his  function  is, 
above  all,  to  record  with  fidelity  what  was  actually 
said  or  done,  no  matter  how  commonplace  it  may  be." 

These  warnings  of  Polybius  were,  however,  com- 
monly neglected  by  the  ancient  historian,  whose  ob- 
ject was  to  interest  his  readers  in  the  great  men  and 
striking  events  of  the  past,  or  to  prepare  him  for  pub- 
lic life  by  describing"  and  analyzing  the  policy  of  former 
statesmen  and  generals,  or  to  teach  him  to  bear  with 
dignity  the  vicissitudes  of  fortune  by  recalling  the 
calamities  of  others.  It  is  clear  that  these  ends  of 
amusing,  instructing,  or  edifying  were  to  be  attained 
mainly  by  Uterary  skill  rather  than  by  painful  his- 
torical research. 

To  Thucydides,  Polybius,  and  Tacitus,  history  ap- 
peared to  be  purely  human  and  secular.  Its  signifi- 
cance was  confined  to  this  world.  To  them  any  allu- 
sion to  the  influence  of  the  gods  or  to  providence  would 
have  seemed  quite  out  of  place.  But  with  the  estab- 
lishment of  the  Christian  church  the  past  began  to 
take  on  a  religious  and  theological  meaning. 

n 

To  the  early  Christians  Hebrew  history,  as  narrated 
in  the  Old  Testament,  served  as  a  very  important 
substantiation  and  illustration  of  their  contention 
that  the  Messiah  had  at  last  come.  By  means  of 
allegorical  interpretation  the  most  casual  episodes  of 


30  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

a  remote  past  could  be  given  a  vivid  and  essential  re- 
lation to  the  present.  The  Christians  were  perhaps  the 
first  to  suspect  a  real  grandeur  in  history,  for  to  them 
it  became  a  divine  epic,  stretching  back  to  the  creation 
of  man  and  forward  to  the  final  separation  of  the  good 
and  evil  in  a  last  magnificent  and  decisive  crisis. 

But  this  theological  unity  and  meaning  of  history 
was  won  at  the  tremendous  sacrifice  of  all  secular  per- 
spective and  accuracy.  The  Amorites  were  invested 
with  an  importance  denied  the  Carthaginians.  Enoch 
and  Lot  loomed  large  in  a  past  which  scarcely  knew  of 
a  Pericles.  Allegory  rendered  all  literary  or  historical 
criticism  irrelevant,  if  not  an  impious  questioning  of 
God's  own  revealed  truth.  Then  Augustine  came  to 
give  an  elaborate  and  plausible  form  to  his  theory  of 
two  cities,  —  a  City  of  God  which  had  existed  from  the 
first  and  which  coidd  be  traced  through  the  Old  Testa- 
ment into  the  New,  and  a  City  of  Satan,  founded  by 
the  fallen  angels,  exemplified  in  King  Belus  and  Queen 
Semiramis,  and  trailing  its  obscene  existence  down 
through  the  Roman  Empire  to  his  own  day.  History 
became  sacred  and  profane.  The  fantastically  inter- 
preted Jewish  records,  continued  in  the  story  of  Chris- 
tian martyrs  and  miracles,  constituted  history  par 
excellence. 

All  the  achievements  of  Egypt,  Greece,  and  Rome 
tended  to  sink  out  of  sight  in  the  mind  of  Augus- 
tine's disciple,  Orosius;  only  the  woes  of  a  devil- 
worshiping    heathendom   lingered.      At   Augustine's 


THE  fflSTORY  OF  HISTORY  31 

suggestion  he  prepared  his  Seven  Books  of  History 
directed  against  the  Pagans.  His  aim  was  to  refute 
those  heathen  detractors  of  Christianity  who  main- 
tained that  their  age  was  accursed  above  all  others, 
owing  to  the  desertion  of  the  ancient  gods.  He  boldly 
maintained  that,  on  the  contrary,  a  veritable  carnival 
of  death  had  preceded  the  appearance  of  Christianity. 
To  prove  this  he  brought  together,  as  he  tells  us,  in  the 
compass  of  a  single  volume,  all  the  examples  he  could 
find  in  the  annals  of  the  past  "of  the  most  signal  hor- 
rors of  war,  pestilence,  and  famine,  of  the  fearful  devas- 
tations of  earthquakes  and  inundations,  the  destruc- 
tion wrought  by  fiery  eruptions,  by  lightning  and  hail, 
and  the  awful  misery  due  to  crime."  His  convenient 
and  edifying  treatise  became  the  standard  manual  of 
universal  history  for  a  thousand  years  to  follow.  It 
was  agreeable  reading  to  medieval  Christians,  and  it 
enjoyed  the  sanction  of  the  chief  among  the  church 
fathers.  History  thus  became  for  Orosius,  and  for 
his  innumerable  readers  in  succeeding  centuries,  the 
story  of  God's  punishment  of  sin  and  of  the  curse  which 
man's  original  transgression  had  brought  upon  the 
whole  earth. 

But  we  need  not  expose  ourselves  to  the  hot  and 
withering  blasts  of  Orosius's  rhetoric  in  order  to 
realize  the  salient  contrast  between  his  conception  of 
history's  purpose  and  usefulness,  and  that  of  the  clas- 
sical Greek  and  Roman  writers.  In  the  old  days  the 
danger  had  been  that  Clio  would  fall  into  the  way  of 


32 


THE  NEW  HISTORY 


aping  her  sisters,  Poetry  and  the  Drama,  and  of  bor- 
rowing their  finery.  Now,  she  permitted  herself  to 
be  led  away  blindfolded  by  Theology,  which  was  for 
so  long  to  be  the  potent  rival  of  literature.  The  Greek 
historians  and  the  greatest  of  the  Romans,  Tacitus, 
were  forgotten  in  the  Middle  Ages ;  so  the  polemical 
pamphlet  of  Orosius  served  to  distort  Europe's  vision 
of  the  past  for  a  thousand  years  until  Thucydides  and 
Polybius  came  once  more  within  its  ken. 

But  even  the  revival  of  classical  learning  by  no 
means  put  an  end  to  the  "providential"  conception  of 
the  past.  This  finds  beautiful  expression  in  Bossuet's 
Universal  History.  He  perceives  behind  all  the  great 
events  which  he  recalls,  the  secret  ordering  of  Provi- 
dence :  — 

Dieu  tient  du  plus  haut  des  cieux  les  renes  de  tous  les 
royaumes ;  il  a  tous  les  coeurs  en  sa  main ;  tantot  il  retient  les 
passions,  tantot  il  leur  lache  la  bride,  et  par  la  il  remue  tout  le 
genre  humain.  Veut-il  faire  des  conquerants;  U  fait  marcher 
I'epouvante  devant  eux,  et  il  inspire  a  eux  et  a  leurs  soldats  une 
hardiesse  invincible.  Veut-il  faire  des  legislateurs ;  il  leur  en- 
voie  son  esprit  de  sagesse  et  de  prevoyance ;  il  leur  fait  prevenir 
les  maux  qui  menacent  les  etats,  et  p)oser  les  fondements  de  la 
tranquillite  publique.  II  conn6it  la  sagesse  humaine,  toujours 
courte  par  quelque  endroit ;  il  I'eclaire,  il  etend  ses  vues,  et  puis 
I'abandonne  a  ses  ignorances ;  il  I'aveugle,  il  la  precipite,  il  la 
confond  par  elle-meme ;  eUe  s'enveloppe,  elle  s'embarrasse  dans 
ses  propres  subtilites,  et  ses  precautions  lui  sont  un  piege.  Dieu 
exerce  par  ce  moyen  ses  redoutables  jugements,  selon  les  regies  de 
sa  justice  toujours  infaillible.  * 

*  Discours  sur  Vhistoire  universdle,  concluding  chapter. 


THE  HISTORY  OF  HISTORY  33 

Unhappily  the  mysterious  character  of  divine  dis- 
pensations opened  the  door  to  conflicting  views  of  their 
meaning.  All  history  seemed  to  Bossuet  to  exhibit 
God's  constant  solicitude  for  the  Catholic  Church  and 
his  anger  against  all  who  swerved  from  the  faith  de- 
livered to  Peter  and  handed  down  by  his  successors. 
Luther,  on  the  other  hand,  believed  that  History  sup- 
ported him  in  his  attack  upon  what  he  called  the  "Teu- 
fels  Nest  zu  Rom."  And  not  long  after  his  death  a 
group  of  Protestants  had  compiled  a  vast  history 
of  the  church  —  The  Magdeburg  Centuries,  as  it  was 
called  —  in  which  they  sought  to  prove  the  diabolical 
origin  of  the  papacy  and  of  the  Roman  Catholic 
Church.  Cardinal  Baronius  replied  in  twelve  folio 
volumes,  written,  as  he  trusted,  under  the  direct 
auspices  of  the  Virgin  Mary,  in  which  he  set  forth  "the 
calamities  divinely  sent  for  the  punishment  of  those 
who  have  dared  to  oppose  in  their  arrogance,  or  con- 
spire against,  the  true  church  of  God."  For  three 
centuries  each  party  continued  to  suborn  history  in  its 
own  interest,  and  one  must  still,  to-day,  allow  for 
religious  bias  in  important  fields  of  historical  research. 
Yet  in  spite  of  all  their  bitterness  and  blindness,  reli- 
gious controversies  have  stimulated  much  scholarly  in- 
vestigation in  modern  times,  and  we  should  be  much 
poorer  if  certain  works  of  a  distinctly  partisan  char- 
acter had  never  been  written, — such,  for  example,  as 
Raynaldus'  continuation  of  Baronius  and,  in  our  own 
days,  Janssen's  History  of  the  German  People. 


34  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

To  the  authors  of  the  Magdeburg  Centuries  and 
to  Cardinal  Baronius  —  to  Protestant  and  Catholic 
historians  alike  —  the  great,  obvious,  determining 
historical  forces  were  God  and  the  devil.  Our  con- 
ception of  God,  as  well  as  our  ideas  of  history,  have, 
however,  been  changing  since  the  sixteenth  century, 
and  it  is  rare  now  to  find  a  historian  who  possesses  the 
old  confidence  in  his  ability  to  penetrate  God's  coun- 
sels and  trace  his  dispensations  in  detail.  As  for  the 
devil,  few  events  can  longer  be  ascribed  to  him  with 
perfect  assurance. 

Ill 

The  reversion  to  the  worldly  standards  of  historical 
composition,  represented  by  Macchiavelli  and  Guic- 
ciardini  in  the  early  sixteenth  century,  became  pro- 
nounced in  the  eighteenth.  Gibbon,  Voltaire,  Hume, 
Robertson,  and  others  successfully  resecularized  his- 
tory and  strove  to  give  their  narrative  of  political 
events  the  ancient  elegance  of  form. 

Lord  Bolingbroke,  in  his  Letters  on  the  Study  of 
History,  written  about  1737,  says:  "An  applica- 
tion to  any  study  that  tends  neither  to  make  us  better 
men  and  better  citizens  is  at  best  but  a  specious  and 
ingenious  sort  of  idleness;  .  .  .  and  the  knowledge 
we  acquire  by  it  is  a  creditable  kind  of  ignorance,  noth- 
ing more.  This  creditable  kind  of  ignorance  is,  in  my 
opinion,  the  whole  benefit  which  the  generality  of 
men,  even  the  most  learned,  reap  from  the  study  of 


THE  HISTORY  OF  HISTORY  35 

history :  and  yet  the  study  of  history  seems  to  me  of 
all  others  the  most  proper  to  train  us  up  to  private 
and  public  virtue."  History,  he  quite  properly  says, 
is  read  by  most  people  as  a  form  of  amusement,  as 
they  might  play  at  cards.  Some  devote  themselves 
to  history  in  order  to  adorn  their  conversation  with 
historical  allusions,  —  and  the  argument  is  still 
current  that  one  should  know  enough  of  the  past  to 
imderstand  literary  references  to  noteworthy  events 
and  persons.  The  less  imaginative  scholar,  Boling- 
broke  complains,  satisfies  himself  with  making  fair 
copies  of  foul  manuscripts  and  explaining  hard  words 
for  the  benefit  of  others,  or  with  constructing  more  or 
less  fantastic  chronologies  based  upon  very  insecure 
data.  Over  against  these  Bolingbroke  places  those 
who  have  perceived  that  history  is  after  all  only 
"philosophy  teaching  by  example."  For  "the  exam- 
ples which  we  find  in  history,  improved  by  the  lively 
descriptions  and  the  just  explanations  or  censures  of 
historians,"  will,  he  believes,  have  a  much  better  and 
more  permanent  effect  than  declamation,  or  the  "dry 
ethics  of  mere  philosophy."  Moreover,  to  summarize 
his  argument,  we  can  by  the  study  of  history  enjoy  in 
a  short  time  a  wide  range  of  experience  at  the  expense 
of  other  men  and  without  risk  to  ourselves.  History 
enables  us  "to  live  with  the  men  who  lived  before  us, 
and  we  inhabit  countries  that  we  never  saw.  Place 
is  enlarged,  and  time  prolonged  in  this  manner :  so 
that  the  man  who  applies  himself  early  to  the  study  of 


36  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

history  may  acquire  in  a  few  years,  and  before  he  sets 
foot  in  the  world,  not  only  a  more  extended  knowledge 
of  mankind,  but  the  experience  of  more  centuries  than 
any  of  the  patriarchs  saw."  Our  own  personal  expe- 
rience is  doubly  defective ;  we  are  bom  too  late  to  see 
the  beginning,  and  we  die  too  soon  to  see  the  end  of 
many  things.  History  supplies  in  a  large  measure 
these  defects. 

There  is,  of  course,  little  originality  in  Bolingbroke's 
plea  for  history's  usefulness  in  making  wiser  and  better 
men  and  citizens.  Polybius  had  seen  in  history  a 
guide  for  statesmen  and  mihtary  commanders;  and 
the  hope  that  the  striking  moral  victories  and  de- 
feats of  the  past  would  serve  to  arouse  virtue  and  dis- 
courage vice  has  been  urged  by  innumerable  chroniclers 
as  the  main  justification  of  their  enterprises.  To-day, 
however,  one  rarely  finds  a  historical  student  who  would 
venture  to  recommend  statesmen,  warriors,  and  moral- 
ists to  place  any  confidence  whatsoever  in  historical 
analogies  and  warnings,  for  the  supposed  analogies 
usually  prove  illusive  on  inspection,  and  the  warnings, 
impertinent.  Whether  or  no  Napoleon  was  ever  able 
to  make  any  practical  use  in  his  own  campaigns  of  the 
accounts  he  had  read  of  those  of  Alexander  and  Caesar, 
it  is  quite  certain  that  Admiral  Togo  would  have  de- 
rived no  useful  hints  from  Nelson's  tactics  at  Alexan- 
dria or  Trafalgar.  Our  situation  is  so  novel  that  it 
would  seem  as  if  political  and  military  precedents  of 
even  a  century  ago  could  have  no  possible  value.    As 


THE  HISTORY  OF  HISTORY  37 

for  our  present  "anxious  morality,"  as  Maeterlinck 
calls  it,  it  seems  equally  clear  that  the  sinful  extrava- 
gances of  Sardanapalus  and  Nero,  and  the  conspicuous 
public  virtue  of  Aristides  and  the  Horatii,  are  alike 
impotent  to  promote  it. 

In  the  eighteenth  century  a  considerable  number  of 
"philosophies  of  history"  appeared  and  enjoyed  great 
popularity.  They -were  the  outcome  of  a  desire  to 
seize  and  explain  the  general  trend  of  man's  past.  Of 
course  this  had  been  also  the  purpose  of  Augustine 
and  Bossuet,  but  Voltaire  devoted  his  Philosophie  de 
Vhistoire  (1765)  mainly  to  discrediting  religion  as 
commonly  accepted ;  and  instead  of  offering  any  par- 
ticular theory  of  the  past  he  satisfied  himself  with  pick- 
ing out  what  he  calls  "  les  verites  utiles."  He  addresses 
Madame  du  Ch§,telet  in  the  opening  of  his  Essai  sur 
les  Moeurs  et  V esprit  des  nations  as  follows :  — 

Vous  ne  cherchez  dans  cette  immensity  que  ce  qui  merite 
d'etre  connu  de  vous ;  Tesprit,  les  moeurs,  les  usages  des 
nations  principales,  appuyes  des  faits  qu'il  n'est  pas  permis 
d'ignorer.  Le  but  de  ce  travail  n'est  pas  de  savoir  en  quelle 
annee  un  prince  indigne  d'etre  connu  succeda  k  un  prince 
barbare  chez  une  nation  grossiere.  Si  Ton  pouvait  avoir  le 
malheur  de  mettre  dans  sa  tete  la  suite  chronologique  de  toutes 
les  dynasties,  on  ne  saurait  que  des  mots.  Autant  il  faut  con- 
naitre  les  grandes  actions  des  souverains  qui  ont  rendu  leurs 
peuples  meilleurs  et  plus  heureux,  autant  on  p)eut  ignorer  le 
vulgaire  des  rois,  qui  ne  pourrait  que  charger  la  memoire.  .  .  . 
Dans  tons  ces  recueils  immenses  qu'on  ne  pent  embrasser,  il 
faut  se  borner  et  choisir.  C'est  im  vaste  magazin  oil  vous 
prendrez  ce  qui  est  a  votre  usage. 


38  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

Voltaire's  reactions  on  the  past  were  naturally  just 
what  might  have  been  expected  from  his  attitude 
toward  his  own  times.  He  drew  from  "le  vaste  mag- 
azin"  those  things  that  he  needed  for  his  great  cam- 
paign, and  in  this  he  did  well,  however  uncritical  his 
criticism  may  seem  at  times  to  a  modern  historical 
student. 

Herder  in  his  little  work,  Auch  eine  Philosophie  der 
Geschichte  zur  Bildung  der  MenschheU.  Beitrag  zur 
vielen  Beitragen  des  Jahrhunderts  (1774),  condemns 
the  general  light-heartedness  and  superficiality  of 
Voltaire  and  other  contemporary  writers  who  were,  he 
thought,  vainly  attempting  to  squeeze  the  story  of  the 
universe  and  man  into  their  puny  philosophic  cate- 
gories. Ten  years  later  he  wrote  his  larger  work, 
Ideen  zur  Geschichte  der  MenschheU,  in  which  he  strove 
to  give  some  ideal  unity  and  order  to  the  vast  historic 
process,  beginning  with  a  consideration  of  the  place  of 
the  earth  among  the  other  heavenly  bodies,  and  of 
man's  relations  to  the  vegetable  and  animal  kingdoms. 
"If,"  he  says,  "there  be  a  god  in  nature,  there  is  in 
history  too ;  for  man  is  himself  a  part  of  creation,  and 
in  his  wildest  extravagances  and  passions  must  obey 
laws  not  less  excellent  and  beautiful  than  those  by 
which  all  the  celestial  bodies  move.  Now,  as  I  am 
persuaded  that  man  is  capable  of  knowing,  and  des- 
tined to  attain  the  knowledge  of,  everything  that  he 
ought  to  know,  I  step  freely  and  confidently  from  the 
tumultuous  scenes  through  which  we  have  been  wander- 


THE  fflSTORY  OF  HISTORY 


39 


ing,  to  inspect  the  beautiful  and  sublime  laws  of  nature 
by  which  they  have  been  governed."  Humanity  is 
the  end  of  human  nature,  he  held,  and  the  human  race 
is  destined  to  proceed  through  various  degrees  of  civi- 
lization in  various  mutations ;  but  the  permanency  of 
its  welfare  is  founded  solely  and  essentially  on  reason 
and  justice.  It  is,  moreover,  a  natural  law  that  "if  a 
being  or  system  of  beings  be  forced  out  of  the  perma- 
nent position  of  its  truth,  goodness,  and  beauty,  it 
will  again  approach  it  by  its  internal  powers,  either  in 
vibrations  or  in  an  as)miptote,  since  out  of  this  state 
it  finds  no  stability."  Herder  formulates  from  time 
to  time  a  considerable  number  of  other  "laws"  which 
he  believes  emerge  from  the  confusion  of  the  past. 
Whatever  we  may  think  of  these  "laws,"  he  con- 
stantly astonishes  the  modern  reader  not  only  by  his 
penetrating  criticism  of  the  prevailing  philosophy  of 
his  time,  but  by  flashes  of  deep  historical  insight.  He 
is  clearly  enough  the  forerunner  of  the  "Romantic" 
tendency  that  culminated  in  Hegel's  celebrated  Phi- 
losophy of  History. 

IV 

Since  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century,  new 
interests  other  than  the  more  primitive  literary, 
political,  military,  moral,  and  theological,  have  been 
developing.  These  have  exercised  a  remarkable 
influence  upon  historical  research,  radically  altering 


40  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

its  spirit  and  aims  and  broadening  its  scope.  To  take 
a  single  example,  Montesquieu's  Spirit  of  Laws  — 
first  published  in  1748  —  reviews  the  past  with  the 
purpose  of  estabUshing  a  purely  scientific  proposition, 
namely,  the  relativity  of  all  human  institutions,  social, 
political,  educational,  economic,  legal,  and  military. 
The  discussions  attending  the  drafting  of  the  first 
French  Constitution  (i 789-1 791)  served  to  provoke  a 
study  of  constitutional  history  which  has  never  since 
flagged. 

Early  in  the  nineteenth  century  the  cosmopolitan 
sentiments  so  conspicuous  at  the  opening  of  the  French 
Revolution  began  to  give  way  to  the  spirit  of  national- 
ity which  was  awaking  in  the  various  European  states, 
especially  in  Germany.  This  almost  immediately 
showed  itself  in  a  new  and  highly  characteristic  in- 
terpretation of  the  philosophy  of  history.  Although 
the  writer  makes  no  pretensions  to  understanding 
Hegel,  it  may  be  worth  while  to  repeat  a  few  things 
he  said  in  his  lectures  on  the  philosophy  of  history, 
first  delivered  in  Berlin  in  the  winter  of  1822-1823, 
for  many  people  have  thought  they  did  understand  him 
and  were  deeply  affected  by  his  teachings.  As  he 
looked  back  over  the  restless  mutations  of  individuals 
and  peoples,  existing  for  a  time  and  then  vanishing, 
he  was  confident  that  he  could  trace  the  World-Spirit 
striving  for  consciousness  and  then  for  freedom,  its 
essential  nature.  This  spirit  assumes  successive  forms 
which  it  successively  transcends.    These  forms  are 


THE  HISTORY  OF  HISTORY  4I 

exhibited  in  the  peculiar  natural  genius  of  historic 
peoples.  The  spirit  of  a  particular  people,  having 
strictly  defined  characteristics,  "erects  itself,"  Hegel 
explains,  "into  an  objective  world  that  exists  and 
persists  in  a  particular  form  of  reUgious  worship,  cus- 
toms, constitution  and  political  laws, — in  short,  in 
the  whole  complex  of  its  institutions,  and  in  the  events 
and  transactions  that  make  up  its  history."  The  Per- 
sians, Hegel  held,  were  the  first  world-historical  people, 
for  was  it  not  in  Persia  that  the  World-Spirit  first 
began  to  attain  an  "unlimited  immanence  of  subjec- 
tivity"? The  Greek  character  was  "individuality 
conditioned  by  beauty."  "Subjective  inwardness" 
was  the  general  principle  of  the  Roman  world.  In- 
genious as  this  theory  may  be,  it  would  hardly  have 
formed  the  basis  of  a  new  gospel  of  national  freedom 
and  deeply  affected  historical  interpretation,  had  it 
not  been  for  Hegel's  extraordinary  discovery  that  it 
was  his  own  dear  German  nation  in  which  it  had 
pleased  the  "  Wei tgeist "  to  assume  its  highest  form. 
"The  German  Spirit  is  the  Spirit  of  the  new  world," 
Hegel  proclaims ;  "its  aim  is  the  realization  of  abso- 
lute truth,  as  the  unlimited  self-determination  of 
Freedom.  .  .  .  The  destiny  of  the  German  peoples 
is  to  be  the  bearers  of  the  Christian  principle." 

The  supreme  role  assigned  by  Hegel  to  his  own 
countrymen  filled  them  with  justifiable  pride.  And 
was  not  this  assumption  amply  borne  out  by  the 
glories  of  "Deutschthimi"  in  the  Middle  Ages,  which 


42  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

the  Romanticists  were  singing :  and,  much  more  re- 
cently, by  the  successful  expulsion  of  the  French 
tyrant  ?  That  all  this  should  combine  to  give  a  dis- 
tinct national  and  patriotic  trend  to  historic  research 
and  writing  was  inevitable.  The  great  collection  of 
the  sources  for  the  German  Middle  Ages, — the  "Mon- 
umenta  Germaniae  Historica"  —  which  was  to  become 
a  model  for  other  nations,  began  to  be  issued  in  1826, 
and  for  the  first  time  the  Germans  became  leaders  in 
the  historical  field  as  in  so  many  others.  Ranke, 
Dahn,  Giesebrecht,  Waitz,  Droysen,  and  dozens  of 
others  who  began  to  devote  themselves  to  German 
history,  were  all  filled  with  a  warm  patriotism  and  en- 
thusiasm very  different  from  the  cosmopolitan  spirit 
of  the  preceding  century.  Throughout  Europe,  his- 
tory tended  to  become  distinctly  national,  and  an  ex- 
traordinary impetus  was  given  to  the  pubhcation  of 
vast  collections  of  material. 

It  was  natural  that  this  national  spirit  and  the  po- 
litical and  constitutional  questions  of  the  nineteenth 
century  should  serve  to  perpetuate  the  older  interest 
in  political  history.  This  is  the  most  ancient,  most 
obvious,  and  easiest  kind  of  history,  for  the  policy  of 
kings,  the  laws  they  issued  and  the  wars  they  fought, 
have  always  been  the  matters  which  were  likeliest  to 
be  recorded.  Then  the  State  is  the  most  imposing 
and  important  of  man's  social  creations,  and  histo- 
rians have  commonly  felt  that  what  was  best  worth 
knowing  in  the  past  could  be  directly  or  indirectly 


THE  HISTORY  OF  HISTORY  43 

associated  with  its  history.  Ranke,  Droysen,  Mauren- 
brecher,  Freeman,  and  many  others  deemed  political 
history  to  be  history  in  its  most  unmistakable  form. 


We  have  now  reviewed  the  chief  motives  which 
appear  to  have  influenced  the  greater  number  of  his- 
torical writers  from  Thucydides  to  Macaulay  and 
Ranke.  They  all  agreed  in  examining  more  or  less 
conscientiously  and  critically  the  records  of  past 
events  and  conditions  with  a  view  to  amusing,  edify- 
ing, or  comforting  the  reader.  But  none  of  the  main 
interests  of  which  I  have  so  far  spoken  can  be  regarded 
as  scientific.  To  scan  the  past  with  the  hope  of  dis- 
covering recipes  for  the  making  of  statesmen  and 
warriors,  of  discrediting  the  pagan  gods,  of  showing 
that  Catholic  or  Protestant  is  right,  of  exhibiting 
the  stages  of  self-realization  of  the  Weltgeist,  or  demon- 
strating that  Liberty  emerged  from  the  forests  of 
Germany  never  to  return  thither,  —  none  of  these 
motives  are  scientific,  although  they  may  go  hand  in 
hand  with  much  sound  scholarship.  But  by  the 
middle  of  the  nineteenth  century  the  Muse  of  History 
—  semper  mutahile  —  began  to  fall  under  the  potent 
spell  of  natural  science.  She  was  no  longer  satis- 
fied to  celebrate  the  deeds  of  heroes  and  nations  with 
the  lyre  and  shrill  flute  on  the  breeze-swept  slopes  of 
Helicon;    she  no  longer  durst  attempt  to  vindicate 


44  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

the  ways  of  God  to  man.  She  came  to  recognize 
that  she  was  ill-prepared  for  her  undertakings,  and 
began  to  spend  her  mornings  in  the  library,  collating 
manuscripts  and  making  out  lists  of  variant  readings. 
She  aspired  to  do  even  more,  and  began  to  talk  of 
raising  her  chaotic  mass  of  information  to  the  rank 
of  a  science. 

The  results  of  history's  new  ambition  to  become 
scientific  are  of  the  greatest  importance.  In  the  first 
place  the  sources  of  information  in  regard  to  the  past 
began  to  be  viewed  with  critical  suspicion.  So  long  as 
historians  continued  to  present  to  the  reader  such 
conspicuous  events  as  they  thought  might  enlist  his 
interest,  and  commented  on  these  with  a  view  of 
fortifying  his  virtue  or  patriotism  or  staying  his  faith 
in  God,  it  made  little  difiference  whether  they  took 
pains  to  verify  the  facts  or  not.  Indeed,  the  exact 
truth,  when  we  are  lucky  enough  to  get  a  glimpse  of 
it,  is  rarely  so  picturesque  or  so  edifying  as  "what 
might  have  been."  But  to-day  a  large  part  of  the 
historian's  attention  is  directed  to  the  character, 
reliability,  or  defects  of  his  sources.  The  data  upon 
which  history  rests  have  been  subjected  to  the  most 
searching  scrutiny.  Much  that  was  formerly  relied 
upon  has  either  been  partially  rejected  or  thrown  out 
altogether ;  but  much  has  also  been  added  by  scru- 
pulous search  and  systematic  cataloguing. 

Moreover,  the  historian  now  realizes  clearly  that 
all  his  sources  of  information  are  inferior,  in  their  very 


THE  HISTORY  OF  HISTORY  45 

nature,  to  data  available  in  the  various  fields  of  natural 
science.  He  can  almost  never  have  any  direct  expe- 
rience of  the  phenomena  which  he  describes.  He  only 
knows  the  facts  of  the  past  by  the  imperfect  traces 
they  have  left,  whether  in  books,  documents,  inscrip- 
tions, or  in  the  remains  of  buildings  and  other  archae- 
ological survivals.  The  traces  he  finds  in  books  — 
upon  which  he  has  been  wont  to  rely  chiefly  —  are 
usually  only  the  reports  of  some  one  who  commonly 
did  not  himself  have  any  direct  experience  of  the  facts 
and  who  did  not  even  take  the  trouble  to  tell  us  where 
he  got  his  alleged  information.  This  is  true  of  almost 
all  the  ancient  and  medieval  historians  and  annalists. 
So  it  comes  about  that  "the  immense  majority  of  the 
sources  of  information  which  furnish  the  historian 
with  startling  points  for  his  reasoning  are  nothing 
else  than  traces  of  psychological  operations"  rather 
than  direct  traces  of  facts.  As  a  French  scholar  has 
remarked,  the  historian  is  in  the  position  of  a  chemist 
who  should  be  forced  to  rely  for  his  knowledge  of  a 
series  of  experiments  upon  what  his  laboratory  boy 
tells  him. 

To  take  a  single  example  from  among  thousands 
which  might  be  cited:  Gibbon  tells  us  that  after  the 
death  of  Alaric  in  410  "the  ferocious  character  of 
the  Barbarians  was  displayed  in  the  funeral  of  the 
hero,  whose  valor  and  fortune  they  celebrated  with 
mournful  applause.  By  the  labor  of  a  captive  multi- 
tude they  forcibly  diverted  the  course  of  the  Busen- 


46  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

tinus,  a  small  river  that  washes  the  walls  of  Consentia. 
The  royal  sepulcher,  adorned  with  the  splendid  spoils 
and  trophies  of  Rome,  was  constructed  in  the  vacant 
bed;  the  waters  were  then  restored  to  their  natural 
channel,  and  the  secret  spot  where  the  remains  of 
Alaric  had  been  deposited,  was  forever  concealed  by 
the  inhuman  massacre  of  the  prisoners  who  had  been 
employed  to  execute  the  work."  The  basis  of  this 
account  is  the  illiterate  History  of  the  Goths  written 
by  an  ignorant  person,  Jordanes,  about  a  hundred 
and  forty  years  after  the  occurrence  of  the  supposed 
events.  We  know  that  Jordanes  copied  freely  from 
a  work  of  his  better-instructed  contemporary,  Cas- 
siodorus,  which  has  been  lost.  This  is  absolutely 
all  we  know  about  the  sources  of  our  information. 

Shall  we  believe  this  story,  which  has  found  its  way 
into  so  many  of  our  textbooks  ?  Gibbon  did  not 
witness  the  burial  of  Alaric,  nor  did  Jordanes,  upon 
whose  tale  Gibbon  greatly  improves,  nor  did  Cassi- 
odorus,  who  was  not  born  until  some  eighty  years  after 
the  death  of  the  Gothic  king.  We  can  control  the 
"psychological  operation"  represented  in  Gibbon's 
text,  for  he  says  he  got  the  tale  from  Jordanes,  but, 
aside  from  our  suspicion  that  Jordanes  took  the  story 
from  the  lost  book  by  Cassiodorus,  we  have  no  means  of 
controlling  the  various  psychological  operations  which 
separate  the  tale  as  we  have  it  from  the  real  circum- 
stances. We  have  other  reasons  than  Jordanes' 
authority  for  supposing  that  Alaric  is  dead ;  as  for  the 


THE  HISTORY  OF  HISTORY  47 

circumstances  of  his  burial  we  can  only  say  they  may 
have  been  as  described  but  we  have  only  the  slightest 
reason  for  supposing  that  they  were. 

VI 

A  second  general  result  of  the  scientific  spirit  may  be 
detected  in  Ranke's  proud  boast  that  he  proposed  to 
tell  the  truth,  —  wie  es  eigenilich  gewesen.  This 
modest  ambition  appears  to  have  needed  some  apology 
in  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  century.  Previous 
historians,  as  has  been  explained,  often  had  other 
dominating  motives,  and  history  was  expected  to 
support,  or  at  least  not  run  counter  to,  prevailing 
patriotic  and  religious  prejudices.  A  conscious  re- 
solve, therefore,  to  state  the  facts  as  he  found  them  has 
certainly  placed  the  historian  on  a  far  higher  plane 
than  he  formerly  occupied,  and  has  been  revolutionary 
in  its  effects.  For  example,  a  wide  range  of  rehgious 
phenomena  has  been  subjected  to  really  scientific  ex- 
amination during  the  past  fifty  years,  with  the  most 
startling  results. 

But  to  resolve  to  test  one's  sources  carefully  and 
to  state  only  what  seems  to  be  supported  by  adequate 
evidence  are,  after  all,  only  the  bare  preliminaries 
of  scientific  historiography.  The  quantity  of  facts 
about  the  past  of  man  which  are  susceptible  of  satis- 
factory verification  not  only  far  exceeds  the  compass 
of  any  possible  single  presentation,  but  they  are  so 


48  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

heterogeneous  in  their  character  as  to  invite  a  great 
variety  of  interpretations.  In  what  ways,  we  may 
accordingly  ask  next,  has  the  potent  influence  of 
natural  science  affected  historical  writers  in  the 
choice  of  facts  to  put  before  the  reader  and  in  the 
explanations  and  interpretations  which  they  tender 
him? 

First,  what  are  the  most  striking  traits  of  modem 
scientific  method?  It  may  be  confidently  replied 
that  an  appreciation  of  the  overwhelming  significance 
of  the  small,  the  common,  and  the  obscure,  and  an  un- 
hesitating rejection  of  all  theological,  supernatural,  and 
anthropocentric  explanations,  establish  the  brother- 
hood of  all  scientific  workers,  whatever  their  fields 
of  research.  Then  there  is  the  search  for  natural 
laws  and  their  multiform  applications  which  has 
proved  fruitful  beyond  the  wildest  expectations  of 
the  most  sanguine.  Minute  and  patient  investiga- 
tion, the  discovery  of  natural  explanations  and  of 
natural  laws,  constitute,  then,  the  most  salient  fea- 
tures of  modem  scientific  research. 

History  has  so  long  been  concealed  behind  a  mask 
which  served  either  to  enhance  the  charm  of  her 
homely  features  beyond  all  recognition,  or  to  render 
her  familiar  and  commonplace  form  monstrous  and 
repulsive,  that  it  is  little  wonder  that  historians  only 
slowly  adjust  themselves  to  the  scientific  point  of 
view.  The  older  historians  had  little  inclination 
to  describe  familiar  conditions  and  the  common  rou- 


THE  HISTORY  OF  HISTORY  49 

tine  of  daily  life.  It  was  the  startling  and  exceptional 
that  caught  their  attention  and  which  they  found 
recorded  in  the  sources  on  which  they  depended. 
They  were  like  a  geologist  who  should  deal  only  with 
earthquakes  and  volcanoes,  or,  better  still,  a  zoologist 
who  should  have  no  use  for  anything  smaller  than 
an  elephant  or  less  romantic  in  its  habits  than  a 
phoenix  or  a  basilisk.  The  modernizing  of  history  has 
taken  place  much  more  slowly  and  much  more  re- 
cently than  the  disentangling  of  chemistry  from 
alchemy  and  of  astronomy  from  the  dreams  of  the 
astrologer.  Perhaps  Buckle  was  right  when  he  de- 
clared that  the  historians  have  been,  on  the  whole, 
inferior  in  point  of  intellect  to  thinkers  in  other  fields, 
but  it  should  not  be  forgotten  that  their  task  is  beset 
with  peculiar  and  well-nigh  insurmountable  difficulties, 
when  compared  with  the  problems  of  chemistry  or 
geology.  It  is  no  wonder  that  the  historian's  grad- 
ual escape  from  ancient  misapprehensions  is  largely 
attributable  not  to  his  own  efforts,  but  to  the  general 
influence  of  natural  science  and  to  the  specific  influ- 
ence of  the  various  social  sciences  which  have  made 
their  appearance  from  time  to  time.^ 

The  first  social  science  greatly  to  affect  the  selec- 
tion of  historical  facts  and  their  interpretation  was, 
not  unnaturally.  Political  Economy,  which  developed 
during  the  eighteenth  century.     It  was  not  a  pro- 

*  The  relation  of  history  to  these  newer  social  sciences  is  the  subject 
of  the  essay  which  follows  this. 

■ 


5©  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

fessional  student  of  history,  but  an  economist,  who 
first  suggested  a  new  and  wonderful  series  of  questions 
which  the  historian  might  properly  ask  about  the  past, 
and,  moreover,  furnished  him  with  a  scientific  explana- 
tion of  many  matters  hitherto  ill-understood. 

As  early  as  1845,  ^^^1  Marx  denounced  those  who 
discover  the  birthplace  of  history  in  the  shifting  clouds 
of  heaven  instead  of  in  the  hard,  daily  work  on  earth. 
He  maintained  that  the  only  sound  and  ever  valid 
explanation  of  the  past  must  be  economic.  The  his- 
tory of  society  depends,  he  held,  upon  the  methods 
by  which  its  members  produce  their  means  of  support 
and  exchange  the  products  of  industry  among  them- 
selves. The  methods  of  production  and  transporta- 
tion determine  the  methods  of  exchange,  the  distri- 
bution of  products,  the  division  of  society  into  classes, 
the  relations  of  the  several  classes,  the  existence  of 
the  State,  the  character  of  its  laws,  and  all  that  it 
means  for  mankind. 

We  are  not  concerned  here  with  the  complicated 
genesis  of  this  idea,  nor  with  the  precise  degree  of 
originahty  to  be  attributed  to  Marx's  presentation  of 
it.  Nor  is  there  time  to  explain  the  manner  in  which 
Marx's  theory  was  misused  by  himself  and  his  fol- 
lowers. Few,  if  any,  historians  would  agree  that 
everything  can  be  explained  economically,  as  many  of 
the  socialists  and  some  economists  of  good  standing 
would  have  us  beUeve.  But  in  the  sobered  and 
chastened  form  in  which  most  economists  now  accept 


THE  HISTORY  OF  HISTORY  5I 

the  doctrine,  it  serves  to  explain  far  more  of  the 
phenomena  of  the  past  than  any  other  single  expla- 
nation ever  offered.  In  any  case,  it  is  the  economist 
who  has  opened  up  the  most  fruitful  new  fields  of 
research  by  emphasizing  the  importance  of  those  en- 
during but  often  inconspicuous  factors  which  almost 
entirely  escaped  historians  before  the  middle  of  the 
nineteenth  century.-  The  essential  interest  and  impor- 
tance of  the  normal  and  homely  elements  in  human 
life  have  become  apparent.  The  scientific  historian 
no  longer  dwells  by  preference  on  the  heroic,  spectac- 
ular, and  romantic  episodes,  but  strives  to  recon- 
struct past  conditions.  This  last  point  is  so  signifi- 
cant that  we  must  stop  over  it  a  moment. 

History  is  not  infrequently  still  defined  as  a  record 
of  past  events,  and  the  public  still  expect  from  the 
historian  a  story  of  the  past.  But  the  conscientious 
historian  has  come  to  realize  that  he  cannot  aspire 
to  be  a  good  story-teller  for  the  simple  reason  that,  if 
he  tells  no  more  than  he  has  good  reason  for  believ- 
ing to  be  true,  his  tale  is  usually  very  fragmentary 
and  vague.  Fiction  and  drama  are  perfectly  free 
to  conceive  and  adjust  detail  so  as  to  meet  the 
demands  of  art,  but  the  historian  should  always  be 
conscious  of  the  rigid  Umitations  placed  upon  him. 
If  he  confines  himself  to  an  honest  and  critical  state- 
ment of  a  series  of  events  as  described  in  his  sources, 
it  is  usually  too  deficient  in  vivid  authentic  detail  to 
make  a  satisfactory  story. 


52  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

The  historian  is  coming  to  see  that  his  task  is  essen- 
tially different  from  that  of  the  man  of  letters,  and 
that  his  place  is  rather  among  the  scientists.  He  is 
at  liberty  to  use  only  his  scientific  imagination,  which 
is  quite  different  from  a  literary  imagination.  It  is 
his  business  to  make  those  contributions  to  our  general 
understanding  of  mankind  in  the  past  which  his  train- 
ing in  the  investigation  of  the  records  of  past  human 
events  especially  fit  him  to  make.  He  esteems  the 
events  he  finds  recorded,  not  for  their  dramatic  in- 
terest, but  for  the  light  that  they  cast  on  the  normal 
and  generally  prevalent  conditions  which  gave  rise  to 
them.  It  makes  no  difference  how  dry  a  chronicle 
may  be  if  the  occurrences  that  it  reports  can  be 
brought  into  some  assignable  relation  with  the  more 
or  less  permanent  habits  and  environment  of  a  partic- 
ular people  or  person.  If  it  be  the  chief  function 
of  history  to  show  how  things  come  about,  —  and 
something  has  already  been  said  of  this  matter,^  — 
then  events  become  for  the  historian,  first  and  fore- 
most, evidence  of  general  conditions  and  of  changes 
affecting  considerable  numbers  of  people.  In  this 
respect  history  is  only  following  the  example  set  by 
the  older  natural  sciences:  Zoology,  for  instance, 
dwells  on  general  principles,  not  on  exceptional  and 
startling  creatures  or  on  the  lessons  which  their 
habits  suggest  for  man ;  Mathematics  no  longer 
lingers  over  the  mystic  qualities  of  numbers,  nor 
^  See  above,  pp.  i8  sqq. 


THE  fflSTORY  OF  HISTORY  53 

does  the  astronomer  seek  to  read  our  individual  fate 
in  the  positions  of  the  planets.  But  scientific  truth  has 
shown  itself  able  to  compete  with  fiction,  and  there 
is  endless  fascination  for  the  modem  mind  in  the  con- 
templation of  what  former  ages  would  have  regarded 
as  the  most  vulgar  and  tiresome  commonplace. 

It  was  inevitable  that  attempts  would  be  made  to 
reduce  history  to  a  science  by  seeking  for  its  laws  and 
by  reconstructing  it  upon  the  hues  suggested  by  the 
natural  sciences.  The  most  celebrated  instance  of 
this  is  Buckle's  uncompleted  History  of  Civilization, 
the  first  volume  of  which  appeared  in  1857.  It  seemed 
to  him  that  while  the  historical  material  which  had 
been  collected,  when  looked  at  in  the  aggregate, 
had  "a  rich  and  imposing  appearance,"  the  real  prob- 
lem of  the  historian  had  hardly  been  suspected,  let 
alone  solved.  ''For  all  the  higher  purposes  of  human 
thought,"  he  declares,  ''history  is  still  miserably 
deficient,  and  presents  that  confused  and  anarchical 
appearance  natural  to  a  subject  of  which  the  laws  are 
unknown  and  even  the  foundations  unsettled."  He 
accordingly  hoped,  he  tells  us,  to  "accomplish  for 
the  history  of  man  something  equivalent,  or  at  all 
events  analogous,  to  what  has  been  effected  by  other 
inquirers  for  the  different  branches  of  natural  science. 
In  regard  to  nature,  events  apparently  the  most 
irregular  and  capricious  have  been  explained,  and  have 
been  shown  to  be  in  accordance  with  certain  fixed 
and  universal  laws.    This  has  been  done  because  men 


54  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

of  ability,  and,  above  all,  men  of  patient,  untiring 
thought,  have  studied  natural  events  with  the  view 
of  discovering  their  regularity;  and  if  human  events 
were  subjected  to  a  similar  treatment,  we  have  every 
right  to  expect  similar  results."  Buckle  proposed 
to  discover  the  laws,  physical  and  mental,  which 
govern  the  workings  of  mankind,  and  then  trace  their 
operations  in  the  general  development  of  civilization. 
Unlike  Marx,  Buckle  believed  that  physical  laws 
tended  to  become  well-nigh  inoperative  in  so  highly 
developed  a  civilization  as  that  of  Europe,  and  that, 
consequently,  moral  and  intellectual  laws  should 
constitute  the  main  object  of  the  historian's  search. 

Fifty  years  have  elapsed  since  Buckle's  book  ap- 
peared, and  I  know  of  no  historian  who  would  venture 
to  maintain  that  we  had  made  any  considerable 
advance  toward  the  goal  he  set  for  himself.  A  sys- 
tematic prosecution  of  the  various  branches  of  social 
science,  especially  political  economy,  sociology,  anthro- 
pology, and  psychology,  is  succeeding  in  explaining 
many  things ;  but  history  must  always  remain,  from 
the  standpoint  of  the  astronomer,  physicist,  or  chemist, 
a  highly  inexact  and  fragmentary  body  of  knowledge. 
This  is  due  mainly  to  the  fact  that  it  concerns  itself 
with  man,  his  devious  ways  and  wandering  desires, 
which  it  seems  hopeless  at  present  to  bring  within  the 
compass  of  clearly  defined  laws  of  any  kind.  Then 
our  historical  knowledge,  as  we  have  seen,  must  for- 
ever rest  upon  scattered  and  highly  precarious  data, 


THE  HISTORY  OF  HISTORY  55 

the  truth  of  which  we  have  often  no  means  of 
testing.  History  can  no  doubt  be  pursued  in  a  strictly 
scientific  spirit,  but  the  data  we  possess  in  regard  to 
the  past  of  mankind  are  not  of  a  nature  to  lend 
themselves  to  organization  into  an  exact  science, 
although,  as  we  shall  see,  they  may  yield  truths  of 
vital  importance. 

The  modern  historical  student  is  well  aware  of  the 
treacherous  nature  of  his  materials  and  their  woeful 
inadequacy,  but  even  conscientious  scholars  have  been 
accustomed,  in  writing  for  the  public,  to  disguise 
their  doubts  and  imcertainties.  The  exigencies  of 
effective  literary  presentation  have  forced  them  to 
conceal  their  pitiful  ignorance  and  yield  to  the  tempta- 
tion to  ignore  yawning  chasms  of  nescience  at  whose 
brink  heavy-footed  History  is  forced  to  halt,  although 
Literature  is  able  to  transcend  them  at  a  leap.  It  is 
largely  an  exaggerated  and  altogether  false  notion  of 
the  extent  of  our  knowledge  that  has  encouraged  the 
reckless  ventures  of  those  who,  like  Buckle  and  Draper, 
have  dreamed  of  reducing  history  to  an  exact  science. 

Fifty  years  ago  it  was  generally  believed  that  we 
knew  something  about  man  from  the  very  beginning. 
Of  his  abrupt  appearance  on  the  freshly  created  earth 
and  his  early  conduct,  there  appeared  to  be  a  brief 
but  exceptionally  authoritative  account.  To-day 
we  are  beginning  to  recognize  the  immense  antiquity 
of  man.  There  are  paleolithic  implements  which 
there  is  some  reason  for  supposing  may  have  been 


56  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

made  a  hundred  or  two  hundred  thousand  years  ago ; 
the  eolithic  remains  recently  discovered  may  perhaps 
antedate  the  paleohthic  by  an  equally  long  period. 
These  are  mere  guesses  and  impressions,  of  course, — 
this  assignment  of  millenniums,  which  appear  to 
have  been  preceded  by  some  hundreds  of  thousands  of 
years  during  which  an  animal  was  developing  with  "a 
relatively  enormous  brain  case,  a  skillful  hand,  and  an 
inveterate  tendency  to  throw  stones,  flourish  sticks," 
and  in  general,  as  Ray  Lankester  expresses  it,  "to 
defeat  aggression  and  satisfy  his  natural  appetites 
by  the  use  of  his  wits  rather  than  by  strength  alone." 
There  may  still  be  historians  who  would  argue  that 
all  this  has  nothing  to  do  with  history,  —  that  it  is 
"prehistoric."  But  "prehistoric"  is  a  word  that  must 
go  the  way  of  "  preadamite,"  which  we  used  to  hear. 
They  both  indicate  a  suspicion  that  we  are  in  some  way 
gaining  illicit  information  about  what  happened  be- 
fore the  foothghts  were  turned  on  and  the  curtain  rose 
on  the  great  human  drama.  Of  the  so-called  "prehis- 
toric" period  we,  of  course,  know  as  yet  very  little  in- 
deed, but  the  bare  fact  that  there  was  such  a  period 
constitutes  in  itself  the  most  momentous  of  historical 
discoveries.  The  earliest  traces  of  an  elaborate  and 
advanced  stage  of  human  civilization  —  found  in  the 
Nile  valley  —  can  hardly  be  placed  earlier  than  six 
thousand  years  ago.  It  is  quite  gratuitous,  however, 
to  assume  that  this  was  the  first  time  that  man  had 
risen  to  such  a  stage  of  culture. 


THE  fflSTORY  OF  HISTORY  57 

Let  US  suppose  that  there  has  been  something  worth 
saying  about  the  deeds  and  progress  of  mankind  during 
the  past  three  hundred  thousand  years  at  least;  let 
us  suppose  that  we  were  fortunate  enough  to  have  the 
merest  outline  of  such  changes  as  have  overtaken  our 
race  during  that  period,  and  that  a  single  page  were 
devoted  to  each  thousand  years.  Of  the  three  hun- 
dred pages  of  our  little  manual  the  closing  six  or  seven 
only  would  be  allotted  to  the  whole  period  for  which 
records,  in  the  ordinary  sense  of  the  word,  exist,  even 
in  the  scantiest  and  most  fragmentary  form.  Or,  to 
take  another  illustration,  let  us  imagine  history  under 
the  semblance  of  a  vast  lake  into  whose  rather  turbid 
depths  we  eagerly  peer.  We  have  reason  to  think  it 
at  least  twenty-five  feet  deep,  perhaps  fifty  or  a  hun- 
dred. We  detect  the  very  scantiest  indications  of  life, 
rara  et  disjecta,  four  or  five  feet  beneath  the  surface; 
six  or  seven  inches  down,  these  are  abundant,  but  at 
that  depth  we  can  detect,  so  to  speak,  no  movements 
of  animate  things,  which  are  scarcely  perceptible 
below  three  or  four  inches.  If  we  are  frank  with 
ourselves,  we  shall  have  to  admit  that  we  can  have  no 
clear  and  adequate  notion  of  anything  happening 
more  than  an  inch  —  indeed,  scarce  more  than  half 
an  inch  —  below  the  surface. 

From  this  point  of  view  the  historian's  gaze,  instead 
of  sweeping  back  into  remote  ages  when  the  earth 
was  young,  seems  to  be  confined  to  his  own  epoch; 
Rameses   II,    Tiglath-Pileser,  and   Solomon   appear 


58  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

practically  coeval  with  Caesar,  Constantine,  Charle- 
magne, St.  Louis,  Charles  V,  and  Victoria;  Bacon, 
Newton,  and  Darwin  are  but  the  younger  contempo- 
raries of  Thales,  Plato,  and  Aristotle.  Let  those  pause 
who  would  attempt  to  determine  the  laws  of  human 
progress  or  decay.  It  is  like  trying  to  determine,  by 
observing  the  conduct  of  a  man  of  forty  for  a  week, 
whether  he  be  developing  or  not.  Anything  approach- 
ing an  adequate  record  of  events  does  not  reach  back 
for  more  than  three  thousand  years,  and  even  this 
remains  distressingly  imperfect  and  unreliable  for  more 
than  two  millenniums.  We  have  a  few,  often  highly 
fragmentary,  literary  histories  covering  Greek  and 
Roman  times,  also  a  good  many  inscriptions  and  some 
important  archaeological  remains ;  but  these  leave  us 
in  the  dark  upon  many  vital  matters.  The  sources 
for  the  Roman  Empire  are  so  very  bad  that  Mommsen 
refused  to  attempt  to  write  its  history.  Only  in  the 
twelfth  and  thirteenth  centuries  do  the  medieval 
annals  and  chronicles  begin  to  be  supplemented  by 
miscellaneous  documents  which  bring  us  more  directly 
into  contact  with  the  Hfe  of  the  time. 

Yet  the  reader  of  history  must  often  get  the  impres- 
sion that  the  sources  of  our  knowledge  are,  so  to  speak, 
of  a  uniform  volume  and  depth,  at  least  for  the  last 
two  or  three  thousand  years.  When  he  beholds  a 
voluminous  account  of  the  early  Church,  or  of  the 
Roman  Empire,  or  observes  Dahn's  or  Hodgkin's 
many  stately  volumes  on  the  Barbarian  invasions, 


THE  HISTORY  OF  HISTORY  59 

he  is  to  be  pardoned  for  assuming  that  the  writers 
have  spent  years  in  painfully  condensing  and  giving 
literary  form  to  the  abundant  material  which  they 
have  turned  up  in  the  course  of  their  prolonged  re- 
searches. Too  few  suspect  that  it  has  been  the  busi- 
ness of  the  historian  in  the  past  not  to  condense  but, 
on  the  contrary,  skillfully  to  inflate  his  thin  film  of 
knowledge  imtil  the  bubble  should  reach  such  propor- 
tions that  its  bright  hues  would  attract  the  attention 
and  ehcit  the  admiration  of  even  the  most  careless 
observer.  One  volume  of  Hodgkin's  rather  old-fash- 
ioned Italy  and  her  Invaders,  had  the  scanty  material 
been  judiciously  compressed,  might  have  held  all  that 
we  can  be  said  to  even  half  know  about  the  matters  to 
which  the  author  has  seen  fit  to  devote  eight  volumes. 
But  one  should  not  jump  to  the  conclusion  that  the 
historical  writer  is  a  sinner  above  all  men.  In  the 
first  place,  it  should  never  be  forgotten  that  he  is  by 
long  tradition  a  man  of  letters,  and  that  that  is  not, 
after  all,  such  a  bad  thing  to  be.  In  the  second  place, 
he  experiences  the  same  strong  temptation  that  every 
one  else  does  to  accept  at  their  face  value  the  plaus- 
ible statements  which  he  finds,  unless  they  conflict 
with  other  accounts  of  the  same  events,  or  appear  to 
be  inherently  improbable.  Lastly,  he  is,  Uke  his  fellow 
primates,  the  victim  of  what  Nietzsche  has  called 
"dream  logic."  I  am  sure  that  we  do  not  reckon  con- 
stantly enough  with  this  inveterate  tendency  of  even 
a  highly  cultivated  mind  instinctively  to  elaborate 


6o  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

and  amplify  mere  hints  and  suggestions  into  complete 
and  vivid  pictures. 

To  take  an  illustration  of  Nietzsche's,  the  vague 
feeling,  as  we  lie  in  bed,  that  the  soles  of  our  feet 
are  free  from  the  usual  pressure  to  which  we  are  ac- 
customed in  our  waking  hours  demands  an  explana- 
tion. Our  dream  explanation  is  that  we  are  flying. 
Not  satisfied  to  leave  its  work  half  done,  dream  logic 
fabricates  a  room  or  landscape  in  which  we  make  our 
aerial  experiments.  Moreover,  just  as  we  are  going 
to  sleep  or  awaking  we  can  often  actually  observe 
how  a  flash  of  light,  such  as  sometimes  appears  on  the 
retina  of  our  closed  eyes,  will  be  involuntarily  inter- 
preted as  a  vision  of  some  human  figure  or  other 
object,  clear  as  a  stereopticon  slide.  Now  any  one 
can  demonstrate  to  himself  that  neither  dream  logic 
nor  the  "mind's-eye  faculty,"  as  it  has  been  called, 
deserts  us  when  we  are  awake.  Indeed  they  may  well 
be,  as  Nietzsche  suspects,  a  portion  of  the  inheritance 
bequeathed  to  us,  along  with  some  other  inconven- 
iences, by  our  brutish  forebears.  At  any  rate  they  are 
forms  of  aberration  against  which  the  historian,  with 
his  literary  traditions,  needs  specially  to  be  on  his 
guard.  There  are  rumors  that  even  the  student  of 
natural  science  sometimes  keeps  his  "mind's  eye"  too 
wide  open,  but  he  is  by  no  means  so  likely  as  the  his- 
torian to  be  misled  by  dream  logic.  This  is  not  to  be 
ascribed  necessarily  to  the  superior  self-restraint  of 
the  scientist,  but  rather  to  the  greater  simplicity  of 


THE  HISTORY  OF  HISTORY  6l 

his  task  and  the  palpableness  of  much  of  his  knowl- 
edge. 

It  is  essential,  as  has  been  pointed  out,  for  every  one 
dealing  with  the  past  of  mankind  to  understand  that 
history  can  never  become  a  science  in  the  sense  that 
physics,  chemistry,  physiology,  or  even  anthropology, 
is  a  science.  The  complexity  of  the  phenomena  is 
appalling,  and  we  have  no  way  of  observing  them  di- 
rectly, to  say  nothing  of  artificially  analyzing  and 
experimenting  with  our  facts.  We  know  absolutely 
nothing  of  the  occurrences  in  the  history  of  mankind 
during  a  great  part  of  his  existence  on  the  earth,  and 
only  since  the  invention  of  printing  do  our  sources  be- 
come in  any  sense  abundant.  Writers  trained  in  the 
natural  sciences,  who  have  attempted  to  show  histo- 
rians how  to  use  their  material,  have  commonly  quite 
misunderstood  the  situation  and  the  conditions  under 
which  the  historian  has  necessarily  to  work.^ 

^  For  example,  Dr.  Draper,  in  his  well-known  Intellectual  Develop- 
ment of  Europe,  undertook  to  prove  two  great  truths  which  he  believed 
had  escaped  the  historians  :  that "  social  advancement  is  as  completely 
imder  the  control  of  natural  law  as  is  bodily  growth,"  and  that  "the 
life  of  an  individual  is  a  miniature  of  the  life  of  a  nation."  Nowhere 
does  he  suggest  that  he  exercised  the  least  care  in  collecting  the  evi- 
dence for  these  hazardous  propositions ;  nowhere  in  his  volumes  does 
he  allude  to  any  sources  of  information  in  regard  to  a  past  which  he 
claims  to  interpret  in  its  scientific  relations.  Not  long  ago  a  Boston 
physician  published  a  work  on  heredity  in  which  he  denounces  the  utter 
superficiality  of  historians  and  then  proceeds  to  build  up  a  theory  of 
royal  heredity  based  on  the  data  found  in  that  ancient  household 
convenience,  Thomas's  Biographical  Dictionary. 


62  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

VII 

But  history,  in  order  to  become  scientific,  had  first 
to  become  historical.  Singularly  enough,  what  we 
now  regard  as  the  strictly  historical  interest  was 
almost  missed  by  historians  before  the  nineteenth 
century.  They  narrated  such  past  events  as  they 
believed  would  interest  the  reader ;  they  commented 
on  these  with  a  view  of  instructing  him.  They  took 
some  pains  to  find  out  how  things  really  were  —  wie  es 
eigentlich  gewesen.  To  this  extent  they  were  scientific, 
although  their  motives  were  mainly  literary,  moral,  or 
religious.  They  did  not,  however,  in  general  try  to 
determine  how  things  had  come  about  —  wie  es 
eigentlich  geworden.  History  has  remained  for  two  or 
three  thousand  years  mainly  a  record  of  past  events, 
and  this  definition  satisfies  the  thoughtless  still.  But 
it  is  one  thing  to  describe  what  once  was ;  it  is  still 
another  to  attempt  to  determine  how  it  came  about. 

It  is  impossible  here  to  trace  the  causes  and  gradual 
development  of  this  genetic  interest.  The  main  reason 
for  its  present  strength  Hes  probably  in  our  modem 
lively  consciousness  of  the  reality  and  inevitability  of 
change,  examples  of  which  are  continually  forcing  them- 
selves upon  our  attention.  The  Greek  historians  had 
little  or  no  background  for  their  narratives.  It  is 
amazing  to  note  the  contemptuous  manner  in  which 
Thucydides  rejects  all  accounts  of  even  the  immedi- 
ately preceding  generations,  as  mere  uncertain  tradi- 


THE  mSTORY  OF  HISTORY  63 

tions.  Polybius  set  himself  the  task  of  tracing  the 
gradual  extension  of  the  Roman  dominion,  but  there 
is  no  indication  that  he  had  any  clear  idea  of  the  con- 
tinuity of  history.  In  the  Middle  Ages  there  was  un- 
doubtedly a  notion  that  the  earth  was  the  scene  of  a 
divine  drama  which  was  to  have  its  denouement  in  the 
definitive  separation  of  the  wheat  from  the  tares ;  but 
this  supernatural  unity  of  history  was  not  scientific 
but  theological.  In  earthly  matters  the  medieval  man 
could  hardly  have  imderstood  the  meaning  of  the 
word  "  anachronism"  ;  the  painters  of  the  Renaissance 
did  not  hesitate  to  place  a  crucifix  over  the  manger  of 
the  divine  infant,  and  there  appears  to  have  been 
nothing  incongruous  in  this  to  their  contemporaries. 

Not  imtil  the  eighteenth  century  did  the  possibility 
of  indefinite  human  progress  become  the  exhilarating 
doctrine  of  reformers,  a  class  which  had  previously 
attacked  existing  abuses  in  the  name  of  the  "good 
old  times."  No  discovery  could  be  more  momentous 
and  fundamental  than  that  reform  should  seek  its 
sanction  in  the  future,  not  in  the  past;  in  advance, 
not  in  reaction.^  It  became  clearer  and  clearer  that 
the  world  did  change,  and  by  the  middle  of  the  nine- 
teenth century  the  continuity  of  history  began  to 
be  accepted  by  the  more  thoughtful  students  of  the 
past,  and  began  to  affect,  as  never  before,  their  motives 
and  methods  of  research. 

*  See  the  final  essay  in  this  volume,  on  "  The  Spirit  of  Conserva- 
tism in  the  Light  of  History." 


64  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

The  doctrine  of  the  continuity  of  history  is  based 
upon  the  observed  fact  that  every  human  institution, 
every  generally  accepted  idea,  every  important  in- 
vention, is  but  the  summation  of  long  lines  of  progress, 
reaching  back  as  far  as  we  have  the  patience  or 
means  to  follow  them.  The  jury,  the  drama,  the 
Gatling  gun,  the  papacy,  the  letter  S,  the  doctrine  of 
stare  decisis,  each  owes  its  present  form  to  ante- 
cedents which  can  be  scientifically  traced.  But 
no  human  interest  is  isolated  from  innumerable  con- 
current interests  and  conditioning  circumstances. 
This  brings  us  to  the  broader  conception  of  the  con- 
tinuity of  change  which  is  attributable  to  the  com- 
plexity of  men's  affairs.  A  somewhat  abrupt  change 
may  take  place  in  some  single  institution  or  habit, 
but  a  sudden  general  change  is  almost  inconceivable. 
An  individual  may,  through  some  modification  of 
his  environment,  through  bereavement  or  malignant 
disease,  be  quickly  and  fundamentally  metamor- 
phosed, but  even  such  cases  are  rare.  If  all  the  habits 
and  interests  of  the  individual  are  considered,  it  will 
be  found  that  only  in  the  most  exceptional  cases  are 
any  great  number  of  these  altered  in  the  twinkling 
of  an  eye.  And  society  for  obvious  reasons  is  in- 
finitely more  conservative  than  the  individual. 
Now  —  and  this  cannot  be  too  strongly  emphasized 
—  the  continuity  of  history  is  a  scientific  truth,  the 
attempt  to  trace  the  slow  process  of  change  is  a  scien- 
tific problem,  and  one  of  the  most  fascinating  in  its 


THE  fflSTORY  OF  HISTORY  6$ 

nature.  It  is  the  discovery  and  application  of  this 
law  which  has  served  to  differentiate  history  from 
literature  and  morals,  and  which  has  raised  it,  in  one 
sense,  to  the  dignity  of  a  science. 

vin 

The  rapidly  developing  specialization  in  history, 
which  is  the  result  of  more  exacting  scientific  stand- 
ards, forces  upon  the  historical  student  a  new  and 
fundamental  question.  If  all  departments  of  knowl- 
edge have  now  become  historical,  what  need  is  there 
of  history  in  general  ?  If  politics,  war,  art,  law,  reli- 
gion, science,  literature,  be  dealt  with  genetically,  will 
not  history  tend  inevitably  to  disintegrate  into  its 
organic  elements?  Professor  Seeley  of  the  Univer- 
sity of  Cambridge  believed  that  it  would.  Twenty 
years  ago  he  declared  that  history  was  after  all  but 
the  name  of  "a  residuum  which  has  been  left  when  one 
group  of  facts  after  another  has  been  taken  possession 
of  by  some  science ;  that  residuimi  which  now  exists 
must  go  the  way  of  the  rest,  and  that  time  is  not  very 
distant  when  a  science  will  take  possession  of  the  facts 
which  are  still  the  undisputed  property  of  the  his- 
torian." 

Now  the  last  question  that  I  have  to  discuss  is 
whether  history,  after  gaining  the  whole  world,  is 
destined  to  lose  her  own  soul.  Let  us  assume  that 
historical  specialization  has  done  its  perfect  work, 


66  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

that  every  distinct  phase  of  man's  past,  every  insti- 
tution, sentiment,  conception,  discovery,  achieve- 
ment, or  defeat  which  is  recorded  has  found  its  place 
in  the  historical  treatment  of  the  particular  branch  of 
research  to  which  it  has  been  assigned  according  to  the 
prevailing  classification  of  the  sciences.  This  process 
of  specialization  would  serve  to  rectify  history  in  a 
thousand  ways,  and  to  broaden  and  deepen  its  opera- 
tions, but,  instead  of  destroying  it,  it  would  rather 
tend,  on  the  contrary,  to  demonstrate  with  perfect 
clearness  its  absolute  indispensability.  Human  afifairs 
and  human  changes  do  not  lend  themselves  to  an 
exhaustive  treatment  through  a  series  of  monographs 
upon  the  ecclesiastical  or  military  organization  of 
particular  societies,  their  legal  procedure,  agrarian 
system,  their  art,  domestic  habits,  or  views  on  higher 
education.  Many  vital  matters  would  prove  highly 
recalcitrant  when  one  attempted  to  force  them  into 
a  neat,  scientific  cubby-hole.  Physical,  moral,  and 
intellectual  phenomena  are  mysteriously  interacting 
in  that  process  of  life  and  change  which  it  falls  to 
the  historian  to  study  and  describe. 

Man  is  far  more  than  the  sum  of  his  scientifically 
classifiable  operations.  Water  is  composed  of  hydro- 
gen and  oxygen,  but  it  is  not  like  either  of  them. 
Nothing  could  be  more  artificial  than  the  scientific 
separation  of  man's  religious,  aesthetic,  economic, 
political,  intellectual,  and  bellicose  properties.  These 
may  be  studied,  each  by  itself,  with  advantage,  but 


THE  fflSTORY  OF  HISTORY  67 

specialization  would  lead  to  the  most  absurd  results 
if  there  were  not  some  one  to  study  the  process  as  a 
whole ;  and  that  some  one  is  the  historian.  Imagine 
the  devotees  of  the  various  social  sciences  each  en- 
gaged in  describing  his  particular  interest  in  the 
Crusades,  or  the  Protestant  Revolt,  or  the  French 
Revolution.  When  they  had  finished,  would  not  the 
historian  have  to  retell  the  story,  utilizing  all  that 
they  had  accomplished,  including  what  they  had  all 
omitted,  and  rectifying  the  errors  into  which  each 
of  the  specialists  had  fallen  on  account  of  his  igno- 
rance of  the  general  situation  ? 

It  would  seem  at  first  sight  as  if  those  most  familiar 
with  each  special  subject  of  research  —  such  as  con- 
stitutional law,  botany,  theology,  philology,  painting, 
chemistry,  economics,  medicine  —  would  be  the  only 
properly  quaUfied  persons  to  trace  its  history;  but 
the  scientific  specialist  is  likely  to  suffer  from  two  dis- 
advantages. In  the  first  place,  his  very  familiarity 
with  the  principles  of  his  particular  branch  of  knowl- 
edge makes  it  difficult  for  him  to  conceive  remote  and 
imfamiliar  conditions  which  historically  lie  back  of 
the  conceptions  which  he  entertains.  In  the  second 
place,  the  discovery,  use,  and  interpretation  of  his- 
torical material  seem  to  require  a  somewhat  prolonged 
and  special  training,  which  only  the  professional  his- 
torical student  is  likely  to  possess.  He  is  constantly 
shocked  by  a  certain  awkwardness  which  those  inex- 
perienced in  historical  research  are  almost  sure  to 


68  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

betray.  They  make  mistakes  which  he  would  not 
make,  in  spite  of  their  greater  knowledge  of  the  sub- 
ject with  which  they  are  dealing.  This  doubtless 
accounts  for  the  fact  that  we  have  as  yet  no  tolerably 
satisfactory  history  of  natural  science,  or  even  of  its 
special  branches.  There  are,  moreover,  certain  im- 
portant phases  of  himian  thought  and  endeavor  where 
the  trained  historian  will  have  no  particular  difficulty 
in  mastering  the  technical  detail  sufficiently  to  deal 
satisfactorily  with  them.  Indeed,  even  the  most 
subtle  of  the  modern  sciences,  not  excluding  mathe- 
matics, were  sufficiently  simple  two  himdred  years 
ago  to  enable  a  well-equipped  historical  student,  with 
some  taste  for  a  particular  human  interest,  to  trace  its 
development  down  until  very  recent  times.  So  it  may 
fall  out,  as  time  goes  on,  that  historical  students  will 
tend  to  speciaUze  more  and  more,  and  will  supply  the 
deficiency  which  students  of  contemporary  branches 
of  science  are  not  ordinarily  in  a  position  to  satisfy, 
—  but  more  will  be  said  on  this  subject,  especially 
in  regard  to  intellectual  history,  in  a  later  essay. 

I  have  frankly  revealed  the  historian's  ignorance; 
he  recognizes  this  in  all  humihty,  and  is  making  every 
effort  to  remedy  it  by  the  application  of  highly  scien- 
tific methods.  He  shares  it,  moreover,  with  the  repre- 
sentatives of  all  the  social  sciences  who  attempt  to 
carry  their  work  back  into  the  past.  The  historian 
will  become  more  and  more  interested,  I  believe,  in 
explaining  the  immediate  present,  and  fortunately 


THE  HISTORY  OF  HISTORY  69 

his  sources  for  the  last  two  or  three  centuries  are  in- 
finitely more  abundant  and  satisfactory  than  for  the 
whole  earlier  history  of  the  world.  He  is  criticizing 
and  indexing  his  sources  and  rendering  them  available 
to  an  extent  which  would  astonish  a  layman  unfamiliar 
with  the  tremendous  amount  that  has  been  accom- 
plished in  this  respect  during  the  past  fifty  years. 

We  have  now  seethed  the  kid  in  its  mother's  milk. 
We  have  explained  history  by  means  of  history. 
The  historian,  from  a  narrow,  scientific  point  of  view, 
is  a  little  higher  than  a  man  of  letters  and  a  good  deal 
lower  than  an  astronomer  or  a  biologist.  He  need  not, 
however,  repudiate  his  Uterary  associations,  for  they 
are  eminently  respectable,  but  he  will  aspire  hereafter 
to  find  out,  not  only  exactly  how  things  have  been,  but 
how  they  have  come  about.  He  will  remain  the 
critic  and  guide  of  the  social  sciences  whose  results  he 
must  synthesize  and  test  by  the  actual  life  of  mankind 
as  it  appears  in  the  past.  His  task  is  so  fascinating 
and  so  comprehensive  that  it  will  doubtless  gradually 
absorb  his  whole  energies  and  wean  him  in  time  from 
literature,  for  no  poet  or  dramatist  ever  set  before 
himself  a  nobler  or  a  more  inspiring  ideal,  or  one 
making  more  demands  upon  the  imagination  and 
resources  of  expression,  than  the  destiny  which  is 
becoming  clearer  and  clearer  to  the  historian. 


THE  NEW  ALLIES  OF  HISTORY 


That  history  must  from  time  to  time  be  rewritten 
is  an  oft-repeated  commonplace.  Why  is  this  ?  The 
past,  as  ordinarily  conceived,  seems  fixed  and  settled 
enough.  No  theologian  has  ever  conceded  to  omnipo- 
tence itseK  the  power  to  change  it.  Why  may  it 
not  then  be  described  for  good  and  all  by  any  one  who 
has  the  available  information  at  his  disposal?  The 
historian  would  answer  that  more  and  more  is  being 
learned  about  the  past  as  time  goes  on,  that  old  errors 
are  constantly  being  detected  and  rectified  and  new 
points  of  view  discovered,  so  that  the  older  accounts 
of  events  and  conditions  tend  to  be  superseded  by 
better  and  more  accurate  ones.  This  is  obvious; 
but  granting  that  each  new  generation  of  historians 
do  their  duty  in  correcting  the  mistakes  of  their 
predecessors,  is  that  all  that  is  necessary?  Is  there 
not  danger  that  they  will  allow  themselves  to  be  too 
largely  guided  in  the  choice  of  their  material  and  in 
their  judgments  of  it  by  the  examples  set  by  preceding 
writers  ?  Are  historians  now  adjusting  themselves  as 
promptly  as  they  should  to  the  unprecedented  amount 
of  new  knowledge  in  regard  to  mankind  in  general 

70 


THE  NEW  ALLIES  OF  HISTORY  7 1 

which  has  been  accumulating  during  the  past  genera- 
tion, and  to  the  fundamental  change  of  attitude  that 
is  taking  place  in  our  views  of  man  and  society  ? 

The  usual  training  which  a  historical  student  re- 
ceives has  a  tendency  to  give  him  the  impression  that 
history  is  a  far  more  fixed  and  definite  thing  than  it 
really  is.  He  is  aware  that  various  elaborate  attempts 
have  been  made  to-  establish  the  Begrif  und  Wesen 
of  history,  that  its  methodology  has  been  the  theme 
of  a  number  of  treatises,  and  that  its  supposed  bound- 
aries have  been  jealously  defended  from  the  dreaded 
encroachments  of  rival  sciences.  Moreover,  he  finds 
the  general  spirit  and  content  of  historical  works 
pretty  uniform,  and  he  is  to  be  forgiven  for  inferring 
that  he  has  to  do  with  a  tolerably  well-defined  sub- 
ject matter  which  may  be  investigated  according  to 
a  clear  and  prescribed  set  of  rules.  I  am  inclined, 
however,  to  think  that  this  attitude  of  mind  is  the 
result  of  a  serious  misapprehension  which  stands  in 
the  way  of  the  proper  development  of  historical  study. 
Before  proceeding  we  must  therefore  stop  a  moment 
to  consider  the  vague  meaning  of  the  term  "history." 

In  the  first  place,  history  has  itself  a  long  and  varied 
history,  which  was  sketched  briefly  in  the  preceding 
essay.  Its  subject  matter,  its  purposes,  and  its 
methods  have  exhibited  in  the  past  a  wide  range  of 
variation  which  suggest  many  future  possibilities 
when  we  once  perceive  the  underlying  causes  of  these 
changes.    It  has,  as  we  have  seen,  somewhat  reluc- 


72  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

tantly  and  partially  adapted  itself  to  the  general  out- 
look of  successive  periods,  and  as  times  changed,  it 
has  changed.  In  the  second  place,  the  scope  of  his- 
torical investigation,  as  actually  carried  on  at  the 
present  day  by  those  who  deem  themselves  historians, 
is  so  wide  as  to  preclude  the  possibiHty  of  bringing 
it  into  any  clearly  defined  category.  The  historian 
may  choose,  for  example,  like  Gibbon,  to  extract 
from  Procopius's  "  improbable  story "  of  Alaric's 
capture  of  Rome  the  circumstances  which  have  an 
air  of  probability.  He  may  seek  to  determine  the 
prevalence  of  malaria  in  ancient  Greece,  or  to  decide 
whether  the  humidity  of  Asia  Minor  has  altered  since 
the  days  of  Croesus,  or  to  trace  the  effects  of  the  issue 
of  some  forty  billions  of  francs  of  paper  money  in 
France  between  1789  and  1800.  As  for  method,  a 
peculiar  training  is  essential  to  determine  the  diver- 
gence between  a  so-called  "  eolith  "  and  an  ordinary 
chip  of  flint  which  does  not  owe  its  form  to  human 
adaptation ;  and  another  kind  of  training  is  required 
to  edit  a  satisfactory  edition  of  Roger  Bacon's  Opus 
Majus.  A  judicious  verdict  on  the  originality  of 
Luther's  interpretation  of  the  words  justitia  dei, 
in  Romans,  i.  17,  demands  antecedent  studies  which 
would  be  inappropriate  if  one  were  seeking  the  motives 
for  Bismarck's  interest  in  insurance  for  the  aged  and 
incapacitated.  I  think  that  one  may  find  solace  and 
intellectual  repose  in  surrendering  all  attempts  to 
define  history,  and  in  conceding  that  it  is  the  business 


THE  NEW  ALLIES  OF  HISTORY  73 

of  the  historian  to  find  out  anything  about  mankind 
in  the  past  which  he  believes  to  be  interesting  or 
important  and  about  which  there  are  sources  of 
information. 

Furthermore,  history's  chances  of  getting  ahead 
and  of  doing  good  are  dependent  on  its  refraining 
from  setting  itself  off  as  a  separate  discipline  and 
undertaking  to  defend  itself  from  the  encroachments 
of  seemingly  hostile  sciences  which  now  and  then 
appear  within  its  territory.  To  do  this  is  to  mis- 
apprehend the  conditions  of  scientific  advance.  No 
set  of  investigators  can  any  longer  claim  exclusive 
jurisdiction  in  even  the  tiniest  scientific  field,  and 
nothing  indeed  would  be  more  fatal  to  them  than  the 
successful  defense  of  any  such  claim.  The  bounds  of 
all  departments  of  human  research  and  speculation 
are  inherently  provisional,  indefinite,  and  fluctuating ; 
moreover,  the  lines  of  demarcation  are  hopelessly 
interlaced,  for  real  men  and  the  real  universe  in  which 
they  live  are  so  intricate  as  to  defy  all  attempts  even 
of  the  most  patient  and  subtle  German  to  establish 
satisfactorily  and  permanently  the  Begriff  und  Wesen 
of  any  artificially  delimited  set  of  natural  phenom- 
ena, whether  words,  thoughts,  deeds,  forces,  animals, 
plants,  or  stars.  Each  so-called  science  or  discipline 
is  ever  and  always  dependent  on  other  sciences  and 
disciplines.  It  draws  its  life  from  them,  and  to  them 
it  owes,  consciously  or  unconsciously,  a  great  part  of 
its  chances  of  progress. 


74  THE  NEW  fflSTORY 

As  Professor  J.  F.  Kemp  has  so  graciously  said  of  his 
own  subject,  geology,  it  could  not  have  matured  with- 
out the  aid  of  those  sister  sciences  which  necessarily 
preceded  it.  "The  great,  roimd  world  in  its  entirety 
cannot  be  grasped  otherwise  than  with  the  assistance 
of  physics,  mechanics,  astronomy,  chemistry,  zoology, 
and  botany."  Not  only  was  geology  in  its  earlier 
growth  "based  upon  the  sister  sciences,  but  now 
progresses  with  them,  leans  largely  upon  them  for 
support,  and  in  return  repays  its  debt  by  the  contri- 
butions which  it  makes  to  each. "  The  historical 
student  should  take  a  similar  attitude  toward  his  own 
vast  field  of  research.  If  history  is  to  reach  its  high- 
est development  it  must  surrender  all  individualistic 
aspirations  and  recognize  that  it  is  but  one  of  several 
ways  of  studying  mankind.  It  must  confess  that, 
like  geology,  biology,  and  most  other  sciences,  it  is 
based  on  sister  sciences,  that  it  can  only  progress 
with  them,  must  lean  largely  on  them  for  support, 
and  in  return  should  repay  its  debt  by  the  contribu- 
tions which  it  makes  to  our  general  understanding  of 
our  species.  Whatever  history  may  or  may  not  be, 
it  always  concerns  itself  with  man.  Would  it  not 
then  be  the  height  of  folly  and  arrogance  for  the  his- 
torian to  neglect  the  various  discoveries  made  about 
man  by  those  who  study  him  in  ways  different  from 
those  of  the  traditional  student  of  the  past  ? 

In  order  to  understand  the  present  plight  of  the 
historian  we  must  go  back  to  the  middle  of  the  nine- 


THE  NEW  ALLIES  OF  HISTORY  75 

teenth  century,  when  for  the  first  time  history  began 
clearly  to  come  under  the  influence  of  the  modern 
scientific  spirit.  Previously,  as  we  have  seen,  it  had 
been  a  branch  of  literature  with  distinctly  literary 
aims,  —  when  it  was  not  suborned  in  the  interest  of 
theological  theories  or  called  upon  to  stimulate  patri- 
otic pride  and  emulation.  But  about  sixty  years  ago 
a  new  era  in  historical  investigation  opened  which  has 
witnessed  achievements  of  a  character  to  justify  in  a 
measure  the  complacency  in  which  historians  now  and 
then  indulge.  The  most  obvious  of  these  achieve- 
ments seem  to  me  to  be  four  in  number,  and  the  his^ 
torian  owes  all  of  them,  if  I  am  not  mistaken,  largely 
to  the  example  and  influence  of  natural  science.  He 
undertook,  in  the  first  place,  to  test  and  examine  his 
sources  of  information  far  more  critically  than  ever 
before,  and  rejected  partially  or  wholly  many  authori- 
ties upon  which  his  predecessors  had  reHed  imphcitly. 
Secondly,  he  resolved  to  tell  the  truth  like  a  man, 
regardless  of  whose  feelings  it  might  hurt.  Thirdly, 
he  began  to  realize  the  overwhelming  importance  of 
the  inconspicuous,  the  common,  and  often  obscure 
elements  in  the  past;  the  homely,  everyday,  and 
normal  as  over  against  the  rare,  spectacular,  and 
romantic,  which  had  engaged  the  attention  of  most 
earlier  writers.  Fourthly,  he  began  to  spurn  super- 
natural, theological,  and  anthropocentric  explanations, 
which  had  been  the  stock-in-trade  of  the  philosophers 
of  history.    I  do  not  propose  to  dwell  upon  these 


76  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

achievements,  for  no  one  will  be  inclined  to  question 
their  fundamental  character.  They  have  cost  a  tre- 
mendous amount  of  labor,  and  they  were  the  essential 
preUminaries  to  any  satisfactory  progress.  Are  they, 
however,  more  than  essential  preliminaries?  Do 
they  not,  on  examination,  prove  to  be  rather  negative 
in  character?  To  resolve  to  tell  the  truth  about 
what  you  have  taken  pains  to  verify  according  to 
your  best  ability;  to  reckon  with  the  regular  and 
normal  rather  than  with  the  exceptional  and  sensa- 
tional; and  to  give  up  appeaUng  to  God  and  the  devil 
as  historical  explanations,  are  but  preparations  for 
the  rewriting  of  history.  They  furnish  the  necessary 
conditions  rather  than  the  program  of  progress. 
Moreover,  they  are  by  no  means  all  of  the  necessary 
conditions.  Still  further  preparations  are  essential 
before  the  historian  can  hope  to  understand  the  past. 
Professor  William  I.  Thomas  well  says:  — 

The  general  acceptance  of  an  evolutionary  point  of  view  of 
life  and  the  world  has  already  deeply  affected  psychology,  phi- 
losophy, morality,  education,  sociology,  and  all  the  sciences  deal- 
ing with  man.  This  view  involves  a  recognition  of  the  fact  that 
not  a  single  situation  in  life  can  be  completely  understood  in  its 
immediate  aspects  alone.  Everything  is  to  be  regarded  as 
having  an  origin  and  a  development,  and  we  cannot  afford  to 
overlook  the  genesis  and  stages  of  change.  For  instance,  the 
psychologist  or  the  neurologist  does  not  at  present  attempt  to 
understand  the  working  and  structure  of  the  human  brain 
through  the  adult  brain  alone.  He  supplements  his  studies  of 
the  adult  brain  by  observations  on  the  workings  of  the  infant 


THE  NEW  ALLIES  OF  fflSTORY  77 

mind,  or  by  an  examination  of  the  structure  of  the  infant  brain. 
And  he  goes  farther  than  this  from  the  immediate  aspects  of 
the  problem  —  he  examines  the  mental  life  and  the  brain  of  the 
monkey,  the  dog,  the  rat,  the  fish,  the  frog,  and  of  every  form 
of  life  possessing  a  nervous  system,  down  to  those  having  only 
a  single  cell,  and  at  every  point  he  has  a  chance  of  catching  a 
suggestion  of  the  meaning  of  the  brain  structure  and  of  mind. 
In  the  lower  orders  of  brain  the  structure  and  meaning  are  writ 
large,  and  by  working  .up  from  the  simpler  to  the  more  complex 
types,  and  noting  the  modification  of  structure  and  function 
point  by  point,  the  student  is  finally  able  to  understand  the 
frightfully  intricate  hiunan  organ,  or  has  the  best  chance  of 
doing  so. 

It  would  seem  as  if  this  discovery  of  the  incalculable 
value  of  genetic  reasoning  should  have  come  from  the 
historians,  but,  curiously  enough,  instead  of  being  the 
first  to  appreciate  the  full  significance  of  historical- 
mindedness,  they  left  it  to  be  brought  forward  by 
the  zoologists,  botanists,  and  geologists.  Worse  yet, 
it  is  safe  to  say  that,  although  the  natural  scientists 
have  fully  developed  it,  the  historian  has  hitherto 
made  only  occasional  use  of  the  discovery,  and  history 
is  still  less  rigidly  historical  than  comparative  anatomy 
or  social  psychology.  Even  in  recent  historical  works 
one  finds  descriptions  of  events  and  conditions,  which 
make  it  clear  that  the  writer  has  failed  to  perceive 
that  all  things  have  an  origin  and  a  development, 
that  we  cannot  afford  to  overlook  their  genesis  and 
stages  of  change,  "that  not  a  single  situation  in  life 
can  be  completely  understood  in  its  immediate  as- 


78  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

pects  alone."  Of  course  the  historian  has  long  talked 
of  the  "rise"  and  "fall"  of  empires,  the  "growth" 
and  "decay"  of  institutions;  he  has  of  late  devoted 
much  attention  to  the  development  of  institutions, 
and  to  this  extent  he  adopts  a  genetic  treatment; 
but  none  the  less  there  lies  back  of  all  his  work  the 
long  tradition  of  what  we  may  call  the  episodal  treat- 
ment of  the  past.  He  is  still  discovered  making  the 
futile  attempt  to  describe  wie  es  eigentlich  gewesen 
without  knowing  wie  es  eigentlich  geworden.  The 
popular  misunderstanding  of  the  French  Revolution, 
for  instance,  is  due  to  the  anxiety  of  the  historian  to 
depict  the  striking  events  from  1789  onward  rather 
than  to  interpret  them  in  the  light  of  their  antecedents, 
which  are  commonly  dispatched  in  an  introductory 
chapter  which  furnishes  no  sufficient  clue  to  what 
follows.  The  "Renaissance"  has  been  pretty  com- 
pletely misconceived,  owing  to  the  ignorance  of 
Biurckhardt  and  Symonds  in  regard  to  the  previous 
period.  The  culture  of  the  Middle  Ages  in  turn  re- 
mains a  mystery  to  one  who  has  not  scrupulously 
studied  the  Weltanschauung  of  the  fourth  century. 

The  historian  still  puts  himself  in  the  position  of 
one  who  should  wake  up  in  a  strange  bed  and  hope 
to  comprehend  his  situation  by  taking  a  careful  in- 
ventory of  the  furniture  of  his  room.  The  strange- 
ness can  only  be  dispelled  and  the  situation  under- 
stood by  falling  back  on  the  past  —  in  this  case  a 
simple  historical  consideration  such  as  that  one  had, 


THE  NEW  ALLIES  OF  fflSTORY  79 

on  his  way  from  Chicago  to  San  Francisco,  been  de- 
layed and  obliged  to  spend  the  night  in  Ogden. 
Should  the  historian  give  us,  for  instance,  the  most 
minute  description  of  the  conditions  in  the  village  of 
Salem  in  the  year  1692,  telling  us  just  where  Goody 
Bishop's  cellar  walls  stood  in  which  the  fatal  ''pop- 
pets" were  found,  and  pointing  out  the  spot  where 
Nehemiah  Abbot's  ox  met  an  untimely  and  sus- 
picious end  by  choking  on  a  turnip,  we  should  still 
fail  to  grasp  this  lamentable  crisis  in  the  affairs  of 
New  England,  for  the  really  vital  question  is,  Why 
did  our  godly  ancestors  hang  old  women  for  alleged 
commerce  with  the  devil?  Only  some  knowledge 
of  comparative  religions  and  of  the  history  of  the 
Christian  church  can  make  that  plain.  Cotton 
Mather  was  the  victim  of  a  complex  of  squalid  super- 
stitions which  the  Protestant  reformers  had  done 
nothing  whatever  to  reduce  or  attenuate.^  He  is  not 
to  be  understood  by  even  the  most  prayerful  study 
of  his  immediate  surroundings. 

The  modern  historical  student's  tendency  to  special- 
ization, his  aspiration  to  master  some  single  field, 
often  stands  in  the  way  of  his  really  understanding 
even  what  he  seems  to  know  most  about.  The 
difference  between  the  best  historical  writing,  which 
is  rare  enough,  and  the  ordinary  run  of  histories,  lies 
in  the  historical-mindedness  of  the  author.  This  is 
susceptible  of  far  greater  development  than  it  has 

*  See  below,  pp.  117  sqq. 


8o  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

hitherto  received/  for  it  should  ultimately  permeate 
all  historical  treatises  that  pretend  to  be  both  con- 
structive and  instructive  and  do  not  merely  confine 
themselves  to  the  accumulation  of  the  raw  material 
of  history. 

Historical-mindedness  is  by  no  means  the  only  great 
debt  that  historians  owe  to  workers  in  fields  seemingly 
remote  from  theirs.  Two  historical  facts  of  tran- 
scendent importance  were  discovered  in  the  latter  half 
of  the  nineteenth  century.  Neither  of  them  was  in 
any  way  attributable  to  historians.  It  was  the  zool- 
ogist who  proved  that  man  is  sprung  from  the  lower 
animals,  and  it  was  an  English  geologist  who  first 
clearly  and  systematically  brought  together  the  evi- 
dence that  man  has  been  sojourning  on  the  earth, 
not  for  six  thousand  years  only,  but  mayhap  for  six 
hundred  thousand.  The  methods  and  outlook  of 
the  historian  prevented  him  from  making  these  dis- 
coveries. He  may  exonerate  himself  for  his  failure 
to  suspect  these  truths  on  the  ground  that  the  data 
used  to  establish  man's  animal  ancestry  and  his  vast 
antiquity  are  wholly  unfamiliar  to  him.     Granting 

*  An  interesting  paper  could  be  written  on  the  common  view  enter- 
tained by  historians  that  it  is  impossible  to  write  the  history  of  oiu: 
own  times ;  that  historical  methods  cannot  be  applied  to  recent  events. 
Those  who  at  one  moment  proclaim  this  doctrine  at  the  next  will 
freely  acknowledge  Thucydides,  who  confined  himself  to  his  own  time, 
to  be  the  greatest  of  all  historians  !  It  is  most  essential  that  we  should 
understand  our  own  time ;  we  can  only  do  so  through  history,  and  it 
is  the  obvious  duty  of  the  historian  to  meet  this,  his  chief  obligation. 


THE  NEW  ALLIES  OF  HISTORY  8l 

the  propriety  of  this  excuse,  it  may  be  asked  whether 
he  has  seriously  reckoned  with  these  two  momentous 
facts  after  they  were  pointed  out  to  him  by  Darwin, 
Lyell,  and  others.  He  has  certainly  been  slow  to  do 
so.  They  were  new  to  the  last  generation  of  histo- 
rians, and  they  would  have  seemed  quite  irrelevant 
to  Ranke  or  Bancroft  in  their  undertakings.  Even 
to-day  I  find  that  members  of  the  guild  are  some  of 
them  inclined  to  deny  that  man's  descent  from  the 
lower  animals  is,  strictly  speaking,  an  historical  fact, 
although  they  would  concede  that  Henry  H's  descent 
from  William  the  Conqueror  is  such. 

What  is  more  important,  most  historical  students 
would  frankly  confess  that  they  saw  no  way  in  which 
man's  descent  or  his  long  sojourn  on  the  earth  could 
be  brought  into  any  obvious  relation  with  the  prob- 
lems on  which  they  were  engaged.  In  this  they  would 
be  quite  right.  It  is  certainly  true  that  most  histori- 
cal investigation  can  be  carried  on  without  reference 
to  man's  origin.  If  one  is  endeavoring  to  determine 
whether  Charles  the  Fat  was  in  Ingelheim  or  Lustnau 
on  July  I,  887,  it  makes  httle  difference  whether  the 
emperor's  ancestors  talked  with  their  Creator  in  the 
cool  of  the  evening  or  went  on  aU  fours  and  slept  in 
a  tree.  If  one  is  locating  the  sites  of  French  forts 
on  the  Ohio  River  or  describing  the  causes  of  Marie 
Antoinette's  repugnance  for  Mirabeau,  the  jaw  of  the 
Heidelberg  man  may  safely  be  neglected.  Whole 
fields  of  historical  research  can  be  cultivated  not  only 


82  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

without  any  regard  to  man's  origin,  but  without  any 
attempt  to  understand  man  as  such.  But  there  are 
many  other,  and  perhaps  even  more  important,  fields, 
as  I  trust  may  become  apparent  later,  in  which  it  is 
essential  that  the  investigator  should  know  everything 
that  is  being  found  out  about  man,  unless  he  is  willing 
to  run  the  risk  of  superficiahty  and  error.  ^ 


^  In  order  to  avoid  the  suspicion  that  I  am  misrepresenting  the 
position  of  what  may  be  called  the  orthodox  historical  student  I  beg  to 
call  the  reader's  attention  to  an  address  delivered  by  Professor  George 
Burton  Adams  of  Yale  before  the  American  Historical  Association, 
December  29,  1908.  He  describes  what,  for  convenience,  he  calls  five 
hostile  movements  directed  against  the  methods,  results,  and  ideals 
of  the  established  political  historian.  These  "  attacks  "  proceed  from 
political  science,  geography,  political  economy,  sociology,  and  "folk- 
psychology."  "For  more  than  fifty  years,"  he  says,  "the  historian 
has  had  possession  of  the  field  and  has  deemed  it  his  suflBcient  mission 
to  determine  what  the  fact  was,  including  the  immediate  conditions 
that  gave  it  shape.  Now  he  finds  himself  confronted  with  numerous 
groups  of  aggressive  and  confident  workers  in  the  same  field  who  ask 
not  what  was  the  fact  —  many  of  them  seem  to  be  comparatively  little 
interested  in  that  —  but  their  constant  question  is  what  is  the  ulti- 
mate explanation  of  history,  or,  more  modestly,  what  are  the  forces 
that  determine  human  events  and  according  to  what  laws  do  they 
act  ?  This  is  nothing  else  than  a  new  flaming  up  of  interest  in  the 
philosophy,  or  the  science,  of  history.  .  .  .  The  emphatic  assertion 
which  they  all  make  is  that  history  is  the  orderly  progression  of  man- 
kind toward  a  definite  end,  and  that  we  may  know  and  state  the  laws 
which  control  the  actions  of  men  in  organized  society.  This  is  the  one 
common  characteristic  of  all  the  groups  I  have  described ;  and  it  is  of 
each  of  them  the  one  most  prominent  characteristic"  (American  His- 
torical Review,  January,  1909).  It  is  the  aim  of  the  present  essay  to 
put  the  whole  situation  in  a  different  light  from  that  in  which  Profes- 
sor Adams  presents  it. 


THE  NEW  ALLIES  OF  fflSTORY  83 

n 

While,  then,  the  historian  has  been  busy  doing  his 
best  to  render  history  scientific,  he  has,  as  we  have 
seen,  left  the  students  of  nature  to  illustrate  to  the 
fuU  the  advantages  of  historical-mindedness  and  to 
make  two  discoveries  about  mankind  infinitely  more 
revolutionary  than  all  that  Giesebrecht,  Waitz, 
Martin,  or  Hodgkin  ever  found  out  about  the 
past.  To-day,  he  has  obviously  not  only  to  adjust 
himself  as  fast  as  he  can  to  these  new  elements  in  the 
general  intellectual  situation,  but  he  must  decide 
what  shall  be  his  attitude  toward  a  considerable  num- 
ber of  newer  sciences  of  man  which,  by  freely  applying 
the  evolutionary  theory,  have  progressed  marvelously 
and  are  now  in  a  position  to  rectify  many  of  the  com- 
monly accepted  conclusions  of  the  historian  and  to 
disabuse  his  mind  of  many  ancient  misapprehensions. 
By  the  newer  sciences  of  man  I  mean,  first  and  fore- 
most. Anthropology,  in  a  comprehensive  sense,  Pre- 
historic archaeology.  Social  and  Animal  psychology, 
and  the  Comparative  study  of  religions.  Political 
economy  has  already  had  its  effects  on  history,  and 
as  for  Sociology,  it  seems  to  me  a  highly  important 
point  of  view  rather  than  a  body  of  discoveries  about 
mankind.  These  newer  social  sciences,  each  studying 
man  in  its  own  particular  way,  have  entirely  changed 
the  meaning  of  many  terms  which  the  historian  has 
been  accustomed  to  use  in  senses  now  discredited  — 


84  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

such  words  as  "race,"  "religion,"  "progress,"  "the 
ancients,"  "culture,"  and  "human  nature."  They 
have  vitiated  many  of  the  cherished  conclusions  of 
mere  historians  and  have  served  to  explain  historical 
phenomena  which  the  historian  could  by  no  possibil- 
ity have  rightly  interpreted  with  the  means  at  his  dis- 
posal.   Let  us  begin  with  prehistoric  archaeology. 

The  conservative  historian  might  be  tempted  to 
object  at  the  start  that  however  important  the  develop- 
ment of  man  would  seem  to  be  before  the  opening  of 
history,  we  can  unfortunately  know  practically  noth- 
ing about  it,  owing  to  the  almost  total  lack  of  docu- 
ments and  records.  Archaeology  has,  of  course,  he 
would  admit,  revealed  a  few  examples  of  man's  handi- 
work which  may  greatly  antedate  the  earliest  finds 
in  Egyptian  tombs ;  some  skulls  and  bones  and  even 
skeletons  have  been  found,  and  no  one  familiar  with  the 
facts  doubts  that  man  was  living  on  the  earth  thou- 
sands of  years  before  the  Egyptian  civiKzation  devel- 
oped. But  what  can  be  known  about  him,  except  the 
shape  of  his  jaw  and  the  nature  of  his  stone  and  bone 
utensils,  which  alone  survive  from  remote  periods? 
If  we  feel  ill-informed  about  the  time  of  Diocletian  or 
Clovis,  how  baseless  must  be  our  conjectures  in  regard 
to  the  habits  of  the  cave  man  ! 

It  is  certainly  true  that  the  home  life  of  the  cave 
man  is  still  veiled  in  obscurity  and  is  likely  to  remain 
so.  Nevertheless,  the  mass  of  information  in  regard  to 
mankind  before  the  appearance  of  the  earliest  sur- 


THE  NEW  ALLIES  OF  HISTORY  85 

viving  inscriptions  has  already  assumed  imposing 
proportions.  Its  importance  is  perhaps  partially 
disguised  by  the  unfortunate  old  term  "prehistoric." 
The  historian  glances  at  case  after  case  of  flint  eo- 
liths, fist  hatchets,  arrow  points,  and  scrapers,  pic- 
tures of  animals  scratched  on  bits  of  bone,  fragments  of 
neolithic  pottery  and  bronze  "celts,"  with  emotions  of 
weariness  tempered  by  some  sUght  contempt  for  those 
who  see  anything  more  in  these  things  than  the  proofs 
that  there  used  to  be  savages  long  ago  similar  to  those 
that  may  still  be  found  in  regions  remote  from  civiliza- 
tion. Further  reflection  should,  however,  convince 
him  that  the  distinction  between  "historic"  and  "pre- 
historic" is  after  all  an  arbitrary  one.  "Prehistoric" 
originally  meant  such  information  as  we  had  about 
man  before  his  story  was  taken  up  by  Moses  and 
Homer,  when  they  were  deemed  the  earliest  surviving 
written  sources. 

History,  however,  in  the  fullest  sense  of  the  term, 
includes  all  that  we  know  of  the  past  of  mankind,  re- 
gardless of  the  nature  of  our  sources  of  information. 
Arehaeological  sources,  to  which  the  student  of  the 
earHer  history  of  man  is  confined;  are  not  only  fre- 
quently superior  in  authenticity  to  many  written 
documents,  but  they  continue  to  have  the  greatest 
importance  after  the  appearance  of  inscriptions  and 
books.  We  now  accept  as  historical  a  great  many 
things  which  are  recorded  neither  in  inscriptions  nor  in 
books.    It  is  an  historical,  not  a  prehistorical,  fact  that 


86  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

the  earliest  well-defined  and  unmistakable  human  tool, 
the  fist  hatchet,  was  used  in  southern  Europe,  in 
Africa,  India,  Japan,  and  North  America.  This  is 
exactly  as  historical  as  the  recorded  word  that  Julius 
Caesar  first  crossed  the  English  Channel  at  the  full  of 
the  moon  —  and  far  more  important. 

Should  the  historical  student  still  find  himself  in- 
di£ferent  to  what  has  been  called  palethnology,^  let 
him  recollect  that  if,  as  it  is  not  hazardous  to  assume, 
the  oldest  fist  hatchets  were  made  by  men  living  two 
hundred  thousand  years  ago,  the  so-called  "historical" 
period  of  from  five  to  seven  thousand  years  has  to  do 
with  but  a  thirtieth  or  a  fortieth  of  the  time  man  has 
been  slowly  and  intermittently  establishing  the  founda- 
tions of  our  present  civilization.  But  the  fist  hatchet 
is,  comparatively  speaking,  a  highly  perfected  imple- 
ment and  is  pretty  well  diffused  over  the  globe,  so  that 
it  suggests  a  vista  of  antecedent  progress  which  sepa- 
rates man's  speechless  and  toolless  ancestors  from  the 
makers  of  the  fist  hatchets.  It  must  be  clear  that  if 
one  ignores  palethnology,  one  runs  the  risk  of  missing 
the  whole  perspective  of  modern  change.  We  have  out- 
grown the  scale  which  served  for  Archbishop  Usher, 

^  The  term  "  prehistoric  "  and  some  such  term  as  palethnology  (sug- 
gested by  de  Mortillet)  are  still  convenient,  since  the  attempt  to  trace 
the  stages  of  development  of  man  previous  to  the  appearance  of  the 
higher,  and  really  very  recent,  forms  of  civilization  which  first  meet 
us  in  Egypt  and  Babylonia  involves  a  particular  technical  equipment, 
including,  for  instance,  some  acquaintance  with  geology  and  paleon- 
tology. 


THE  NEW  ALLIES  OF  HISTORY  87 

who  maintained  that  man  and  all  the  terrestrial  ani- 
mals were  created  on  Friday,  October  28,  4004  B.C., 
and  which  has  led  to  a  great  deal  of  shallow  talk  about 
our  relation  to  "the  ancients"  who  are  in  reaUty  our 
contemporaries. 

It  seems  quite  possible  —  to  suggest  a  single  re- 
flection —  that  human  mental  capacity  has  neither 
increased  nor  declined  during  the  trifling  period  which 
separates  us  from  Plato  and  Aristotle.  Indeed,  could 
we  imagine  a  colony  of  infants  from  the  first  families  of 
Athens  in  the  fifth  century  B.C.,  and  another  the  off- 
spring of  the  most  intellectual  classes  of  to-day,  com- 
pletely isolated  from  civilization  and  suckled  by  wolves 
or  fed  by  ravens,  both  groups  would  start  in  a  stage 
of  decivihzation  suggesting  that  of  the  chimpanzee. 
No  one  can  tell  how  long  it  would  take  the  supreme 
geniuses  which  such  colonies  might  from  time  to  time 
produce,  to  frame  a  sentence,  build  a  fire,  or  chip  a 
nodule  of  flint  into  a  fist  hatchet.  Nor  is  there  reason 
to  think  that  either  colony  would  have  an  advantage 
over  the  other  in  making  the  first  steps  in  progress. 
It  is  only  education  and  social  environment  that 
separate  the  best  of  us  from  a  savagery  far  lower  than 
any  to  be  observed  on  the  earth  to-day,  lower  prob- 
ably than  that  of  the  lowest  man  of  whom  any  traces 
still  exist. 

Then  there  is  the  word  "race,"  which  historical 
writers  have  used  and  still  use  with  great  recklessness. 
Most  of  the  earUer  theories  of  "races"  and  of  the  origin 


88  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

of  man  in  western  Asia  were  either  consciously  sug- 
gested, or  unconsciously  reenforced,  by  the  account  in 
Genesis  of  the  Garden  of  Eden,  the  Deluge,  and  the 
confounding  of  language  during  the  construction  of  the 
Tower  of  Babel.  The  Aryan  theory  set  forth,  for  ex- 
ample, by  Mommsen  in  the  opening  chapter  of  his 
Roman  History,  to-day  appears  well-nigh  as  naive  and 
grotesque  as  the  earlier  notion  of  the  Tower  of  Babel. 
Since  the  geological  period  when  man  may  first  have 
made  his  appearance  on  the  earth,  there  have  been  vast 
changes  in  the  distribution  of  land  and  water,  in  cli- 
mate and  fauna.  These  natural  changes  in  physical 
conditions  must  have  caused  all  sorts  of  migrations 
and  fusions;  add  to  these,  conquests  and  invasions, 
slavery  and  miscellaneous  sexual  relations.  These 
have  brought  the  most  varied  peoples  together  and 
produced  an  inextricable  confusion  of  morals,  manners, 
and  tongues.  In  spite  of  this,  one  still  finds  historical 
students  talking  of  "races"  as  if  we  could  still  believe 
Max  Miiller's  persuasive  tale  of  the  plain  of  Iran  and 
the  dispersion  of  the  Aryans. 

These  illustrations  should  be  sufficient  to  substan- 
tiate the  importance  of  prehistoric  archaeology  for  all 
students  of  history,  since  they  all  run  grave  risks  of 
persisting  in  ancient  error  if  they  neglect  its  results. 
We  are,  however,  by  no  means  confined  to  the  remains 
of  man  and  his  handiwork  for  our  notions  of  what  must 
have  lain  back  of  the  highly  developed  civilizations 
which  we  meet  when  written  records  first  become  avail- 


THE  NEW  ALLIES  OF  HISTORY  89 

able.  If,  as  Professor  William  Thomas  has  so  happily 
phrased  it,  "tribal  society  is  virtually  delayed  civiliza- 
tion, and  the  savages  are  a  sort  of  contemporaneous 
ancestry,"  those  investigators  —  namely,  the  anthro- 
pologists —  who  deal  with  the  habits,  customs,  insti- 
tutions, languages,  and  beliefs  of  primitive  man  are  in 
a  position  to  make  the  greatest  contributions  to  the 
real  understanding  of  history.  From  the  standpoint 
of  man's  development,  anthropology  may  be  regarded 
as  a  branch  of  history  in  the  same  sense  that  animal 
psychology  or  comparative  anatomy  are  branches  of 
human  psychology  and  human  anatomy. 

At  least  one  historian  of  repute  has  recognized  the 
truth  of  this.  Professor  Eduard  Meyer  prefaces 
the  second  greatly  revised  edition  of  his  History  of 
Antiquity  with  a  whole  volume  of  250  pages  on  the 
"Elements  of  Anthropology."  He  says:  "To  have 
prefaced  my  work  with  such  an  introduction  would 
formerly  have  excited  the  surprise  and  encountered 
the  criticism  of  many  of  my  judges  at  a  time  when  the 
interests  of  most  historians  were  entirely  alien  to  such 
questions.  Now,  when  such  matters  are  the  order  of 
the  day,  no  apology  is  necessary.  .  .  .  Indeed,  such 
an  introduction  is  absolutely  essential  for  a  scientific 
and  consistently  conceived  history  of  antiquity." 

The  helpfulness  of  anthropology  for  the  historical 
student  is,  however,  still  much  obscured,  owing  partly 
to  his  indifference  to  the  whole  question  of  human 
development,  and  partly  to  a  more  or  less  justifiable 


90  THE  NEW  fflSTORY 

suspicion  on  his  part  that  there  is  grave  danger  of  being 
misled  in  our  attempt  to  interpret  past  events  and 
conditions  by  anthropological  theories  and  schematism. 
It  is  one  thing,  however,  to  reject  a  tool  because  we 
are  too  stupid  to  see  its  use,  and  another  to  be  on  our 
guard  against  cutting  ourselves.  Even  the  historical 
student  who  is  stolidly  and  complacently  engaged  in 
determining  past  facts  (except  when  he  puts  on  the 
armor  of  the  Lord  to  defend  the  lawful  frontiers  of 
history  against  invaders)  would  surely  find  the  study 
of  anthropology  of  value.  It  would  tend  to  give  him 
poise  and  insight,  preeminently  in  all  matters  having 
to  do  with  religion  or  religious  sanction,  or  the  under- 
lying forces  of  conservatism,  —  and  with  these  subjects 
he  is  constantly  engaged  in  one  form  or  another.  No 
branch  of  modern  research,  indeed,  has  so  upset  older 
historical  conceptions  as  the  comparative  study  of 
religions,  a  science  which  is  quasi-historical  and  quasi- 
anthropological  in  its  sources  and  methods.  The 
older  historians  failed  to  see  very  deeply  into  reli- 
gious phenomena;  manifestations  of  that  class  were 
commonly  taken  for  granted,  and  their  origins  excited 
little  curiosity.  Yet  few  phases  of  human  develop- 
ment have  proved  to  be  more  explicable  than  the  reli- 
gious. The  complex  syncretism  which  resulted  in 
orthodox  Christianity  has  been  laid  bare,  as  well  as 
the  very  ancient  and  primitive  superstitions  which 
were  incorporated  into  the  theology  of  the  church 
fathers. 


THE  NEW  ALLIES  OF  fflSTORY  91 

I  have  been  told  by  M.  Solomon  Reinach,  the  dis- 
tinguished director  of  the  Museum  of  St.  Germain-en- 
Laye,  that  when  Mommsen  visited  the  collections 
some  years  ago,  he  had  never  heard  either  of  the  ice 
age  or  of  totemism  !  He  appeared  to  think  that  the 
terms  might  be  the  ingenious  discoveries  of  M. 
Reinach  himself.  Now,  Mommsen  is  properly  ranked 
among  the  most  extraordinary  historians  of  modern 
times.  The  mass  of  his  work  and  its  quality  are 
familiar  to  us  all.  Nevertheless,  his  ignorance  of 
two  of  the  commonplaces  of  prehistoric  archaeology 
and  anthropology  prevented  him  from  seeing  the 
Roman  civilization  in  its  proper  perspective  and  from 
thoroughly  grasping  its  religious,  and  perhaps  even 
the  legal,  phenomena.  Man,  as  Henry  Adams  has  so 
neatly  expressed  it,  is  now  viewed  as  a  "function"  of 
the  ice  age  during  a  very  long  period.  As  for  totem- 
ism, it  has  been  called  upon  to  explain  such  different 
phenomena  as  the  frescoes  in  the  dark  caves  of  the 
Magdalenien  period,  the  abhorrence  of  the  Jew  for 
pork,  and  the  esteem  of  a  baseball  team  for  its  mas- 
cot. Many  beliefs  and  practices  of  the  Christian 
church  are  now  seen  to  go  back  by  direct  or  devious 
ways  to  totemism,  animism,  and  the  mana. 

The  historical  student  who  realizes  this  will  hasten 
to  acquaint  himself,  if  he  has  not  already  done  so,  with 
some  of  the  most  suggestive  works  in  this  field  of 
anthropology  and  comparative  religion.  He  will  be 
a  very  dull  person  indeed  if  he  does  not  find  his  con- 


92  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

ceptions  of  the  past  fundamentally  changing  as  he 
reads,  let  us  say,  the  extracts  which  Professor  Thomas 
has  so  conveniently  brought  together  in  his  Source 
Book  for  Social  Origins,  or  the  fascinating  Folkways, 
of  the  late  Professor  Sumner;  or  Solomon  Reinach's 
Orpheus,  Conybeare's  Myth,  Magic,  and  Morals,  or  De 
Morgan's  Les  premieres  civilisations,  —  to  mention  only 
the  more  obvious  examples  of  this  class  of  literature. 

Ill 

So  it  has  come  about  that  the  older  notions  of  our 
relations  to  the  so-called  "ancients,"  of  religion  in  gen- 
eral and  Christianity  in  particular,  and  of  "race,"  are 
being  gravely  modified  by  the  investigations  of  those 
who  are  not  commonly  classed  as  historians.  These 
latter  have  demonstrated  the  superficial  character  of 
the  older  historians'  reasoning  and  pointed  the  way 
to  new  and  truer  interpretations  of  past  events  and 
conditions.  Other  terms  which  historians  have  used 
without  any  adequate  understanding  of  them  are 
"progress"  and  "dechne,"  "human  nature,"  "histori- 
cal continuity,"  and  "civilization."  Even  a  slight 
tincture  of  anthropology,  reenforced  by  the  elements 
of  the  newer  allied  branches  of  social  and  animal 
psychology,  will  do  much  to  deepen  and  rectify  the 
sense  in  which  we  use  these  terms. 

Social  psychology,  as  yet  in  an  inchoate  condition, 
is  based  on  the  conviction  that  we  owe  our  own  ego 


THE  NEW  ALLIES  OF  HISTORY  93 

to  our  association  with  others ;  it  is  a  social  product. 
Without  others  we  should  never  be  ourselves.  As 
Professor  George  H.  Mead  expresses  it:  "Whatever 
may  be  the  metaphysical  impossibilities  or  possi- 
bilities of  soUpsism,  psychologically  it  is  non-existent. 
There  must  be  other  selves  if  one's  own  is  to  exist. 
Psychological  analysis,  retrospection,  and  the  study 
of  children  and  primitive  people  give  no  inkling  of 
situations  in  which  self  could  have  existed  in  conscious- 
ness except  as  the  counterpart  of  other  selves," 

It  may  at  first  sight  seem  a  far  cry  from  the  origin 
of  the  ego  and  its  dependence  on  the  socius  to  such  his- 
torical questions  as  the  dates  of  Sargon's  reign,  the 
meaning  of  the  Renaissance,  or  Napoleon's  views  of 
the  feasibility  of  invading  England.  There  are,  how- 
ever, plenty  of  matters  of  still  more  vital  importance 
on  which  the  judgments  of  historical  students  are 
likely  to  be  gravely  affected  by  some  acquaintance 
with  the  recent  discussions  in  regard  to  the  laws  of 
imitation,  with  which  Tarde's  name  is  especially  asso- 
ciated, and  with  the  relation  of  our  reason  to  the  more 
primitive  instincts  which  we  inherit  from  our  animal 
ancestors.  Indeed,  the  great  and  fundamental  ques- 
tion of  how  mankind  learns  and  disseminates  his  dis- 
coveries and  misapprehensions  —  in  short,  the  whole 
rationale  of  human  civilization  as  distinguished  from 
the  life  of  the  anthropoids  —  will  never  be  understood 
without  social  psychology;  and  social  psychology 
will  never  be  understood  without  animal  psychology; 


94  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

these  studies  alone  can  serve  to  explain  the  real  nature 
of  progress  and  retrogression  —  matters  to  which  no 
historical  student  can  afford  to  remain  indifferent. 
There  is  obviously  no  possibility  of  explaining  ade- 
quately in  a  brief  essay  this  rather  perturbing  proposi- 
tion, but  its  importance  seems  to  me  so  great  that  I  am 
going  to  venture  to  present  the  situation  very  briefly. 
In  the  first  place,  is  it  not  clear  that  we  still  permit 
ourselves,  as  is  not  at  all  unnatural,  to  be  victimized 
by  the  old  anthropocentric  conception  of  things? 
This  has  been  so  long  accepted  by  the  western  world 
that  in  spite  of  the  discoveries  of  the  past  sixty  years 
we  find  many  unrevised  notions  from  the  past  still  lurk- 
ing in  the  corners  of  our  judgment.  We  are  constantly 
forgetting,  I  fear,  that  man  was  not  created,  male  and 
female,  in  a  day,  as  Mark  Hopkins  and  those  of  his 
generation  commonly  believed.  We  did  not  begin  our 
human  existence  with  pure  and  holy  aspirations,  a 
well-developed  language,  and  a  knowledge  of  agricul- 
ture, but  are  descended  from  a  long  line  of  brute  an- 
cestors, unable  either  to  talk  or  to  cultivate  the  soil. 
All  animals  that  now  live  or  ever  have  lived  on  the 
earth,  including  man,  "are  mayhap  united  together 
by  blood  relationship  of  varying  nearness  or  remote- 
ness." Every  one  of  us  has  a  pedigree  stretching  back 
not  merely  a  couple  of  hundred  generations,  but 
through  all  geologic  time  since  hfe  first  commenced  on 
the  globe.  Man's  bodily  resemblance  to  the  anthro- 
poid apes  has  long  been  a  subject  of  comment.    Ennius 


THE  NEW  ALLIES  OF  HISTORY  9J 

gave  expression  over  two  thousand  years  ago  to  the 
disconcerting  discovery :  — 

Simia  quam  similis,  turpissima  bestia,  nobis  ? 

With  the  modem  development  of  zoology  and  com- 
parative anatomy  more  intimate  structural  similarities 
were  brought  to  light;  Darwin  sketched  a  portrait 
of  the  turpissima  bestia,  our  hairy  ancestor,  with  his 
tail,  prehensile  foot,  and  great  canine  teeth.  This 
hypothesis  has  since  been  substantiated  by  the  dis- 
covery of  numerous  vestigial  muscles  and  organs,  ata- 
vistic reversions,  and  pathological  conditions  which 
can  be  readily  explained  only  on  evolutionary  groimds. 
But  if  our  bodies  and  their  functions  so  closely  re- 
semble those  of  our  nearest  relatives  among  the  ani- 
mals, what  shall  we  say  of  our  minds?  Are  these 
altogether  different  from  the  animal  minds  from  which 
they  have  gradually  developed,  or  do  they  perpetuate, 
like  our  bodies,  all  the  old  that  is  still  available  and 
perhaps  not  a  few  traits  that  now  merely  hamper  us 
or  tend  to  beget  serious  disorders?  May  not  the 
minds  of  our  remote  ancestors,  who  had  not  yet  learned 
to  talk,  still  serve  us  not  only  in  infancy  and  when  senile 
dementia  overtakes  us,  but  may  they  not  be  our  nor- 
mal guides  in  the  simpler  exigencies  of  life  ?  I  think 
that  it  is  not  hazardous  to  affirm  that  the  perpetuation 
in  man  of  psychological  processes  to  be  observed  in  the 
other  primates  would  be  acknowledged  by  all  students 
of  animal  psychology.   If  this  be  true,  may  we  not  look 


96  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

to  the  study  of  animal  psychology,  as  it  develops,  for 
information  which  will  enable  us  to  discover  and  ap- 
preciate for  the  first  time  what  really  goes  to  make 
up  a  human  being  as  distinguished  from  his  humbler 
relatives  ? 

Comparative,  or  animal,  psychology  has  only  re- 
cently found  a  place  in  some  of  our  universities. 
Professor  E.  L.  Thorndike  was  perhaps  the  first,  some 
twelve  years  ago,  to  attempt  to  put  the  subject  on  a 
modem  experimental  basis.  Since  then  much  has  been 
done,  especially  in  the  United  States.  We  can  hardly 
hope  to  know  very  clearly  what  an  ape  is  thinking 
about  as  he  looks  out  from  under  his  wrinkled  brow. 
"Les  animaux  ne  nous  font  pas  des  confidences," 
as  Reinach  has  truly  observed.  But  scientific  ob- 
servation and  experimentation  are  throwing  light  on 
the  educability  of  apes  and  other  animals  and  on  the 
ways  in  which  they  appear  to  learn.  They  have  al- 
ready proved  that  the  chimpanzee  can  readily  master 
a  vast  number  of  acts  over  and  above  anything  that 
his  ancestors  have  ever  known  in  the  jungle.  He  is 
marvelously  teachable.  He  appears  to  learn  by  "trial 
and  error"  and  by  a  process  which  we  may  term 
"trick  psychology,"  stimulated  by  rewards  and  pun- 
ishments. The  exact  nature  and  role  of  "imitation" 
is  not  yet  very  clear,  but  I  think  that  no  one  can 
doubt  its  importance.  Now  the  obvious  question 
forces  itself  on  us.  Do  we  not  all  learn,  for  the  most 
part,  much  as  the  chimpanzee  learns,  by  trial  and 


THE  NEW  ALLIES  OF  HISTORY  97 

error  and  by  mastering  tricks,  stimulated  by  rewards 
and  punishments,  and  by  "imitation"  ?  The  answer 
will  be,  I  am  convinced,  that  almost  all  our  education 
is  based  on  modified  simian  principles.  To  a  believer 
in  the  continuity  of  history  that  should  be  a  cheering 
discovery,  humiliating  as  it  is  in  other  respects. 

I  am  aware  that  to  most  students  of  history  the 
results  of  comparative  psychology  will  seem  at  first 
sight  too  remote  to  have  any  assignable  bearing  on  the 
problems  that  face  them.  This  impression  is,  however, 
erroneous,  at  least  where  questions  of  the  character 
and  transmission  of  culture  are  involved.  We  can- 
not understand  the  nature  of  culture,  as  distinguished 
from  our  merely  animal  heritage,  without  some  notion 
of  animal  psychology.  It  seems  probable  that  the 
historical  student  will  deal  far  more  intelligently  with 
the  changes  of  thought,  the  development  of  institu- 
tions, the  progress  of  invention,  and  almost  all  reli- 
gious phenomena  when  he  learns  to  distinguish 
between  the  higher  and  rarer  manifestations  of  pecul- 
iarly human  psychology  and  the  current  and  funda- 
mental simian  mental  modes  upon  which  we  still 
rely  so  constantly  with  the  assurance  of  ancestral 
habit. 

I  will  give  but  a  single  illustration  from  this  field  of 
speculation.  Gabriel  Tarde  has  emphasized  the  fact 
that  every  minutest  element  in  civilization,  every 
atom  of  culture  that  we  have,  over  and  above  our 
animal  outfit,  must  either  be  handed  on  from  one 


98  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

generation  to  the  next,  or  else  be  rediscovered,  or 
lost.  Now  it  should  be  part  of  the  historian's  busi- 
ness, and  no  unimportant  part,  to  follow  out  the 
actual  historical  workings  of  this  rule.  Civilization 
is  not  innate,  but  transmitted  by  "  imitation  "  in  the 
large  sense  of  the  word.  A  word,  or  a  particular 
form  of  tool,  or  a  book,  will  die  out  as  surely  as  an 
organism  unless  it  is  propagated  and  regenerated. 
Let  us  apply  this  law  in  a  single  case.  How  little 
addition  to  the  general  disorder  and  to  the  chronic 
discouragements  of  learning  is  necessary  to  account 
for  the  fatal  disappearance  of  Greek  books  in  the 
West  after  the  dissolution  of  the  Roman  Empire ! 
Suppose  only  half  as  many  people  in  Gaul  read 
Greek  in  the  time  of  Gregory  of  Tours  as  had  known  it 
in  Constantine's  time.  How  greatly  would  this  in- 
crease the  chances  of  the  complete  disappearance  of 
Xenophon's  Cyropcedia  or  Euripides's  Elektra  ? 

In  concluding  these  reflections  I  am  painfully  con- 
scious that  they  may  suggest  serious  dangers  to  some 
thoughtful  readers.  The  historical  student  may  be 
ready  to  grant  that  he  has  neglected  the  influence  that 
discoveries  in  other  fields  should  have  on  his  own  con- 
clusions; but  how,  he  will  ask,  is  he  to  find  time  to 
acquaint  himself  with  all  the  branches  of  anthropol- 
ogy, of  sociology,  political  economy,  comparative 
religion,  social  psychology,  animal  psychology,  physi- 
cal geography,  climatology,  and  the  rest  ?  It  is  hard 
for  him  even  to  keep  up  with  the  new  names,  and  he 


THE  NEW  ALLIES  OF  HISTORY  99 

has  a  not  unnatural  distrust  of  those  who  tender  him 
easy  explanations  for  things  that  they  still  know  so 
little  about.  Some  of  the  more  exuberant  represen- 
tatives of  the  newer  social  sciences  remind  the  his- 
torian disagreeably  of  the  now  nearly  extinct  tribe  of 
philosophers  of  history,  who  flattered  themselves  that 
their  penetrating  intellects  had  been  able  to  discover 
the  wherefore  of  man's  past  without  the  trouble  of 
learning  much  about  it. 

But  the  historical  student  who  classes  the  modem 
social  sciences  with  the  old  and  discredited  philosophy 
of  history  is  making  a  serious  mistake.  The  philos- 
ophers of  history  sought  to  justify  man's  past  in  order 
to  satisfy  some  sentimental  craving,  and  their  ex- 
planations were,  in  the  last  analysis,  usually  begotten 
of  some  theological  or  national  prejudice.  The  con- 
temporaneous student  of  society,  on  the  contrary, 
oflfers  very  real  and  valuable,  if  obviously  partial,  ex- 
planations of  the  past.  It  is  true  that  he  sometimes 
forgets  what  Hume  calls  the  "  vast  variety  which 
nature  has  affected  in  her  operations,"  and  tries  to 
explain  more  than  his  favorite  cause  will  account  for, 
but  this  ought  not  to  blind  us  to  his  usefulness. 

It  is  obvious  that,  like  the  geologist,  the  physiolo- 
gist, and  the  biologist,  the  historian  is  forced  to  make 
use  of  pertinent  information  furnished  by  workers  in 
other  fields,  even  if  he  has  no  time  to  master  more  than 
the  elements  of  the  sciences  most  nearly  allied  to  his 
own.    He  may  use  anthropological  and  psychological 


100  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

discoveries  and  information  without  becoming  either 
an  anthropologist  or  a  psychologist.  These  discov- 
eries and  this  information  will  inevitably  suggest  new 
points  of  view  and  new  interpretations  to  the  his- 
torian, and  will  help  to  rectify  the  old  misapprehensions 
and  dispel  the  innumerable  ancient  illusions  which 
still  permeate  our  historical  treatises.  Above  all,  let 
the  historical  student  become  unreservedly  historical- 
minded,  avail  himself  of  the  genetic  explanation  of 
human  experience,  and  free  himself  from  the  suspi- 
cion that,  in  spite  of  his  name  and  assumptions,  he 
is  as  yet  the  least  historical,  in  his  attitude  and 
methods,  of  all  those  who  to-day  are  so  eagerly 
attempting  to  explain  mankind. 

It  may  well  be  that  speculation  in  the  newer  fields 
has  often  far  outrun  the  data  accumulated,  and  the 
historical  student  has  not  infrequently  been  offered 
explanations  of  the  past  which  he  has  done  well  to 
reject.  The  sociologist,  anthropologist,  and  economist 
have  doubtless  often  thought  too  fast  and  too  reck- 
lessly, and  this  has  engendered  an  excessive  reserve 
in  the  historian,  who  has  sometimes  flattered  himself 
on  not  thinking  at  all.  But  there  is,  in  the  long  rim, 
more  risk  in  thinking  too  little  than  too  much,  and  the 
kind  of  thought  suggested  by  the  new  allies  of  his- 
tory should  serve,  if  judiciously  practiced,  greatly  to 
strengthen  and  deepen  the  whole  range  of  historical 
study  and  render  its  results  far  more  valuable  than 
they  have  hitherto  been. 


SOME    REFLECTIONS    ON    INTELLECTUAL 
HISTORY 


Lord  Bacon,  in  his  Advancement  of  Learning,  says : 
"No  man  hath  propounded  to  himself  the  general 
state  of  learning  to  be  described  and  represented 
from  age  to  age,  as  many  have  done  the  works  of 
nature  and  the  State  civil  and  ecclesiastical ;  without 
which  the  history  of  the  world  seemeth  to  me  to  be  as 
the  statue  of  Polyphemus  with  his  eye  out ;  that  part 
being  wanting  which  doth  most  show  the  spirit  and 
life  of  the  person.  And  yet  I  am  not  ignorant  that  in 
divers  particular  sciences,  as  of  the  jurisconsults,  the 
mathematicians,  the  rhetoricians,  the  philosophers, 
there  are  set  down  some  small  memorials  of  the  schools, 
authors,  and  books ;  and  so  likewise  some  barren  rela- 
tions touching  the  invention  of  arts  or  usages.  But  a 
just  story  of  learning,  containing  the  antiquities  and 
originals  of  knowledges  and  their  sects ;  their  inven- 
tions, their  traditions;  their  diverse  administrations 
and  managings ;  their  flourishings,  their  oppositions, 
decays,  depressions,  oblivions,  removes;  with  the 
causes  and  occasions  of  them,  and  all  other  events 
concerning  learning,  throughout  the  ages  of  the  world ; 
I  may  truly  affirm  to  be  wanting." 


I02  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

Three  centuries  have  passed  since  Bacon  wrote 
these  lines,  but  the  deficiency  which  he  points  out  has 
not  yet  been  remedied.  We  have  as  yet  no  "just 
story  of  learning."  It  is  true  that  we  have  histories 
of  certain  kinds  of  thought,  especially  of  philosophy  and 
theology,  but  these  confine  themselves  in  the  main  to 
the  systems  of  distinguished  thinkers,  —  the  Platos, 
Aristotles,  Kants,  and  Kegels,  the  Pauls,  Augustines, 
Aquinases,  Luthers,  and  Jonathan  Edwardses,  — 
rather  than  to  the  conceptions  that  were  current  among 
their  thoughtful  contemporaries.  Only  the  simpler 
and  easier  portions  of  a  philosophic  system  can  be 
thoroughly  digested  by  intelligent  laymen  so  as  to 
influence  the  history  of  opinion.  When  we  speak  of 
Augustinianism,  Hegelianism,  or  Marxism,  we  do  not 
mean  the  complete  philosophic  systems  of  these  writers, 
but  such  particularly  impressive  discoveries,  few  in 
number,  as  stand  out  in  relief  against  the  mass  of 
subtleties  with  which  only  the  expert  will  be  tempted 
to  reckon.  A  member  of  the  intellectual  class  to-day, 
looking  back  and  asking  himself  whence  come  those 
ideas  which  he  himself  accepts  and  which  he  sees  ac- 
cepted by  others  about  him,  will  for  the  most  part  look 
in  vain  in  histories  of  philosophy  for  answers  to  his 
questions.  Bacon's  reproach  is  still  merited,  for  no 
one  has  as  yet,  so  far  as  I  know,  ever  clearly  conceived 
of  a  general  history  of  the  chief  opinions  of  the  intellec- 
tual class. 

Yet  what  more  vital  has  the  past  to  teach  us  than 


REFLECTIONS  ON  INTELLECTUAL  HISTORY      103 

the  manner  in  which  our  convictions  on  large  ques- 
tions have  arisen,  developed  and  changed?  We  do 
not,  assuredly,  owe  most  of  them  to  painful  personal 
excogitation,  but  inherit  them,  along  with  the  in- 
stitutions and  social  habits  of  the  land  in  which  we 
live.  The  content  of  a  well-stocked  mind  is  the 
product  of  tens  of  thousands  of  years  of  accumu- 
lation. Many  widespread  notions  could  by  no  possi- 
bility have  originated  in  modern  times,  but  have  arisen 
in  conditions  quite  alien  to  those  of  the  present.  We 
have  too  often,  in  consequence,  an  outworn  intellec- 
tual equipment  for  new  and  unheard-of  tasks.  Only  a 
study  of  the  vicissitudes  of  human  opinion  can  make  us 
fully  aware  of  this  and  enable  us  to  readjust  our  views 
so  as  to  adapt  them  to  our  present  environment.  If 
it  be  true,  as  was  maintained  in  an  earUer  essay,  that 
opinion  tends,  in  the  dynamic  age  in  which  we  live, 
to  lag  far  behind  our  changing  environment,  how  can 
we  better  discover  the  anachronisms  in  our  views  and 
in  our  attitude  toward  the  world  than  by  studying 
their  origin  ?  Is  not  Bacon  right  in  accusing  the  his- 
torian of  presenting  us  with  an  image  of  the  past  with- 
out its  great  cyclopean  eye,  which  alone  reveals  its 
spirit  and  life? 

The  eager  interest  of  the  public  in  this  neglected 
field  is  shown  by  the  long-continued  popularity  of  Dr. 
Draper's  Intellectual  Development.  This  work  has  for 
years  enjoyed  a  reputation  far  exceeding  its  merits. 
From  a  modern  standpoint  the  book  is  deficient  in 


I04  THE  NEW  fflSTORY 

almost  every  respect,  except  its  effective  style  and  the 
assurance  of  its  author.  Dr.  Draper  has  not  seen  fit 
at  any  point  to  give  the  reader  the  slightest  clue  to  the 
sources  of  his  information,  but  it  is  clear  to  the  critical 
reader  that  his  impressions  were  derived  from  such  mis- 
cellaneous works  as  were  available  in  the  early  sixties, 
and  that  his  conclusions  do  not  at  any  point  rest  upon 
a  conscientious  study  of  first-hand  material.  His 
object,  he  frankly  tells  us,  was  to  prove  two  laws, 
which  no  one  nowadays  would  believe  to  be  laws  at 
all.i 

About  the  same  time  that  Draper's  work  appeared, 
Lecky  published  his  Rise  and  Influence  of  Rationalism 
in  Europe.  This  is  on  a  very  different  plane  from 
Draper's  volumes.  It  is  the  result  of  careful  investi- 
gation, and  exhibits  the  characteristic  prudence  and 
intellectual  poise  of  the  writer.  Unhappily,  however, 
it  confines  itself  in  the  main  to  the  last  three  centuries 
of  European  development,  with  only  such  background 
as  seemed  essential  to  make  the  tale  clear. 

A  third  work  which  has  attracted  much  attention 
is  Andrew  D.  White's  Warfare  of  Science  and  Theology. 
This  is  written  with  a  polemical  eagerness  begotten 
perhaps  of  Ex-President  White's  own  effective  par- 
ticipation in  the  battle.  He  was  aided  in  his  work  by 
scholars  who  supplied  him  with  a  large  amount  of  evi- 
dence, which  he  used  with  the  utmost  effect  in  routing 
the  theologians;  but  the  avowed  object  of  the  book 
^  See  above,  p.  64,  note. 


REFLECTIONS  ON  INTELLECTUAL  fflSTORY      105 

is  to  reveal  the  absurdities  of  patristic  and  medieval 
tradition  rather  than  to  present  impartially  the  ele- 
ments of  intellectual  history. 

Leslie  Stephen,  in  his  English  Thought  in  the  Eight- 
eenth Century,  has  done  much  to  supplement  the  his- 
tories of  eighteenth-century  philosophy  and  literature. 
A.  W.  Benn,  in  his  English  Rationalism  in  the  Nineteenth 
Century,  has  traced  the  growing  discontent  with  that 
class  of  opinions  which  had  received  a  religious  sanc- 
tion. Merz's  History  of  European  Thought  in  the  Nine- 
teenth Century  is  perhaps  the  most  scholarly  and  signal 
contribution  to  a  general  history  of  the  intellectual  class 
that  has  yet  appeared.  Some  of  his  chapters  furnish 
excellent  illustrations  of  the  profitable  character  of 
this  hne  of  historical  investigation.  More  recently 
Henry  Osbom  Taylor  has  given  us  a  masterly  picture  of 
The  MedicEval  Mind,  which  is  at  once  sympathetic  and 
critical,  and  is  based  upon  an  assiduous  intercourse  with 
the  sources.  All  of  these,  whatever  their  merits,  are, 
however,  confined  to  particular  periods,  if  we  except 
Draper's  now  obsolete  volumes,  and  in  none  of  them 
would  the  reader  find  a  general  summary  of  the  chief 
phases  through  which  the  European  intellect  has  passed. 

Any  effort  to  "propound  to  one's  self  the  general 
state  of  learning  to  be  described  from  age  to  age  "  might 
seem  destined  to  failure  in  view  of  the  intricate  prob- 
lems offered  by  each  particular  period.  Nevertheless 
it  would  not  be  impossible,  could  one  emancipate  him- 
self from  the  traditional  presentation  of  the  past,  to 


Io6  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

present  in  an  orderly  way  the  development  of  the  chief 
concomitants  of  our  own  particular  intellectual  heri- 
tage, always  keeping  before  one  the  attitude  of  mind 
and  range  of  knowledge  of  the  intellectual  class  at 
large,  rather  than  that  of  special  investigators  and 
scholars:  its  convictions  on  certain  large  questions, 
its  methods  of  reasoning,  its  powers  of  criticism,  its 
authorities,  the  sources  of  information  that  it  has 
from  time  to  time  cherished,  whether  human  or  divine, 
the  range  of  its  knowledge,  and  the  depth  of  its  igno- 
rance, as  judged  by  what  had  gone  before  and  what 
came  after.  Special  emphasis  should  naturally  be  laid 
throughout  on  the  modes  of  attaining  and  transmitting 
knowledge  —  or  what  was  mistaken  for  such  —  and  its 
application  to  the  welfare  and  improvement  of  man's 
estate  in  this  world  or  the  next. 

II 

One  who  attempted  to  trace  the  general  history  of 
thought  to-day  would  have  to  take  into  consideration 
certain  vital  discoveries  which  could  not  have  influ- 
enced Lecky  and  Draper.  We  are  now  tolerably  well 
assured  that  could  the  human  mind  be  followed  back, 
it  would  be  found  to  merge  into  the  animal  mind,  and 
that  consequently  the  recently  developing  study  of  ani- 
mal or  comparative  psychology  is  likely  to  cast  a  great 
deal  of  light  upon  certain  modes  of  thought.  I  do 
not  mean  by  this  that  there  is  any  reason  to  suppose 


REFLECTIONS  ON  INTELLECTUAL  HISTORY      107 

that  the  animals  exercise  reason  in  the  narrower  sense 
of  that  term,  but  that  there  is,  at  certain  points,  a 
striking  parallehsm  between  the  methods  of  learning 
in  the  higher  animals  and  in  ourselves.  In  any  case  a 
study  of  animal  psychology  brings  out  more  clearly 
than  can  otherwise  be  done  the  essential  pecuUarities 
of  human  psychology.  Certain  of  the  higher  animals, 
especially  the  apes,  are  remarkably  educable  and 
show  the  possibiUties  of  learning,  independently  of 
reason.  This  capacity  for  learning  without  the  use  of 
reason  we  not  only  share  with  the  animals,  but  we  have 
it  in  a  far  greater  degree  than  they.  The  exact  nature 
of  human  culture  and  its  method  of  transmission,  as 
well  as  of  human  reason  as  over  against  simian 
mental  processes,  can  only  be  made  apparent  by  this 
new  science  of  animal  psychology,  which  is  now  being 
assiduously  cultivated,  especially  in  the  United  States. 
The  equally  new  branch  of  social  psychology,  as 
was  p>ointed  out  in  the  previous  essay,  ought  in 
time  to  make  plainer  the  nature  and  extent  of  our 
dependence  on  our  fellow-men.  In  short,  we  not 
only  retain  our  animal  mind,  but,  in  addition,  those 
more  primitive  forms  of  reasoning,  which  anthropolog- 
ical research  is  discovering  to  be  common  to  all  so- 
called  primitive  peoples.  Just  as  our  animal  mind 
stands  us  in  good  stead  in  certain  crises,  so  the  more 
primitive  forms  of  reasoning  are  always  present  when 
they  are  not  submerged  by  accumulations  of  knowl- 
edge and  artificially  developed  criticism. 


I08  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

Of  the  gradual  clarification  of  man's  psychology 
through  hundreds  of  thousands  of  years,  we  can  only 
judge  from  the  vestiges  we  have  of  human  handiwork 
supplemented  by  the  inferences  that  may  be  made 
from  the  reasoning  of  the  savage  and  the  progressive 
unfolding  of  the  infant's  mind.  Previous  to  the  ap- 
pearance of  written  records,  we  must  judge  of  what 
man  knew,  by  the  scanty  vestiges  of  what  he  did;  in 
no  other  way  can  we  discover  the  foundations  of  the 
first  historic  culture  of  which  we  have  any  tolerable 
knowledge,  that  of  the  Egyptians,  dating  back  five  or 
six  thousand  years. 

The  Egyptians  do  not  appear  to  have  led  an  intel- 
lectual Hfe  in  the  later  Greek  sense  of  the  term.  They 
elaborated  an  intricate  theory  of  existence  after  death ; 
they  made  many  industrial  discoveries,  and  observed 
the  heavens  with  such  care  as  was  necessary  in  order 
best  to  utilize  the  rise  and  fall  of  the  river  upon  which 
they  were  dependent  for  subsistence.  Western  Europe 
doubtless  owed  to  the  Egyptians  more  than  can  ever 
be  determined.  It  is,  however,  from  the  Babylonians 
and  Assyrians  that  we  get  our  divisions  of  time,  the 
hours,  minutes,  and  seconds,  and  the  plan  of  dividing 
the  circle  into  360  parts.  The  Greeks,  and,  later, 
western  Europe,  derived  their  astrological  enthusiasm 
from  these  older  civilizations. 

Intellectual  life  in  the  narrower  sense  of  the  term  ap- 
pears, as  far  as  we  can  trace  it,  to  have  found  its  first 
home  among  the  Ionian  Greeks,  and  especially  in  the 


REFLECTIONS  ON  INTELLECTUAL  HISTORY      109 

city  of  Miletus,  some  six  or  seven  hundred  years  before 
Christ.  But  underlying  the  speculations  of  Thales, 
Anaximander,  and  other  members  of  this  group  is  the 
vast  substructure  which  has  been  touched  upon  above. 
When  the  Ionian  philosophers  asked  what  was  the 
principle  of  all  things,  they  asked  a  question  which  is 
highly  sophisticated  and  artificial  and  which  repre- 
sents a  type  of  scientific  abstraction  which  can  only 
come  with  great  maturity  of  thought.  There  has  been, 
so  to  speak,  a  desperate  struggle  ever  since  the  time 
of  Thales  to  maintain  this  scientific  ambition,  which 
has  constantly  been  threatened  with  destruction  by 
older  and  more  primitive  types  of  thought,  that  may 
be  classified  as  practical,  mystical,  and  romantic. 

The  Ionian  philosophers  and  those  of  Elia  appear 
to  have  exercised  their  minds  on  highly  metaphysical 
questions,  such  as  "  the  one  and  the  many,"  "  being  and 
not  being,"  and  the  paradoxes  which  such  conceptions 
suggested.  Suddenly,  almost  without  warning,  we 
find  the  Sophists  of  Athens  presenting  a  fullness  and 
maturity  of  intellectual  Ufe  which  in  many  respects 
can  scarcely  be  paralleled  to-day.  Unhappily  their 
works  are  for  the  most  part  lost,  and  it  may  well  have 
been  that  much  of  their  speculation  was  —  like  that 
of  Socrates  —  not  written  out,  but  was  confined  to 
conversation  and  oral  disputation.  Our  impressions 
of  what  they  talked  about  are  derived  chiefly  from  a 
hostile  Plato  and  from  citations  in  Aristotle. 

So  abounding  is  the  intellectual  vitality  of  these  two 


no  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

writers,  so  inexhaustible  the  range  of  their  speculations, 
so  profound  their  philosophical  penetration,  that  one 
who  dedicates  himself  to  the  study  of  their  works  is 
apt  to  feel  that  all  intellectual  history  since  their  day 
is  only  the  record  of  a  degeneration.  It  would  become 
necessary,  therefore,  in  tracing  the  intellectual  history 
of  Europe,  to  ask  one's  self  not  so  much  what  Plato  and 
Aristotle  themselves  may  have  believed  or  discovered, 
as  what  particular  phases  of  their  thought  were  gener- 
ally current  among  the  intellectual  class  in  their 
own  or  in  later  times.  It  was  their  fate  to  become, 
above  all  other  individual  thinkers,  the  teachers  of  the 
Europe  from  which  we  derive  our  intellectual  heritage. 
It  must  be  remembered  that,  on  the  one  hand,  Cicero 
and  the  new  Academy  traced  its  amiable  skepticism 
back  to  Plato,  and  that,  on  the  other  hand,  Plotinus 
and  the  Neoplatonists  believed  that  they  derived 
their  super-rational  and  ecstatic  tenets  from  the  same 
source.  As  for  Aristotle,  while  he  fills  the  modern 
critic,  whether  his  interests  be  in  letters,  philosophy, 
science,  or  politics,  with  astonishment  and  admiration, 
it  should  not  be  forgotten  that  he  was  the  idol  of  the 
thirteenth-century  scholastics,  who  made  his  vicious 
theory  of  essences  and  final  causes  and  his  infertile 
syllogistic  reasoning  the  basis  of  their  speculation. 

The  scholars  of  the  Hellenistic  period  at  Alexandria 
and  elsewhere  appear  in  certain  fields  to  have  carried 
on  the  Hellenic  traditions  in  a  profitable  way,  but  their 
additions  to  knowledge  were  more  than  counterbalanced 


REFLECTIONS  ON  INTELLECTUAL  HISTORY      m 

by  a  vast  literature  of  comment,  exegesis,  and  literary 
criticism  which  made  little  appeal  to  thoughtful  men 
in  the  Roman  period.  The  works  of  the  Alexandrian 
school  were  mainly  permitted  to  perish,  with  the  no- 
table exception  of  Euchd  and  the  geographical,  astro- 
nomical, and  astrological  compilations  of  Ptolemy, 
which  were  taken  up  by  the  Arab  scholars  and  reap- 
peared in  the  thirteenth  century  in  western  Europe. 

The  melancholy  decline  of  Hellenism  in  the  later 
Roman  Empire  was  accompanied  by  the  development 
of  new  types  of  intellectual  enthusiasm  based  upon 
entirely  different  presuppositions  in  regard  to  man's 
origin  and  chief  business  in  life.  One  of  the  great  modern 
historical  discoveries  is  that  what  we  term  "medieval" 
thought  was  to  all  intents  and  purposes  completely 
elaborated  in  the  later  Roman  Empire,  before  the  Ger- 
mans disrupted  the  western  portions  of  the  vast  com- 
monwealth organized  by  Augustus.  An  emotional 
revolution  had  begim  as  early  as  Plutarch  and  had 
gradually  served  to  denature  the  traditions  of  the  in- 
tellectual hfe  as  they  had  come  down  from  Athens. 
Reason  became  an  object  of  suspicion ;  its  impotence 
seemed  to  have  been  clearly  proved ;  the  intellectual 
class  sought  solace  not  so  much  in  the  restraints  of 
Stoicism  as  in  the  abandon  of  Neoplatonism,  and  the 
vagaries  of  theurgy  and  of  oriental  mysticism.  The 
clarity  and  moderation  which  we  associate  with  Hellen- 
ism gave  place  to  the  deprecation  of  reason  and  a  cor- 
responding confidence  in  the  supernatural.    Plotinus 


112  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

maintained  that  only  the  meaner  things  of  life  come 
within  the  scope  of  reason;  that  the  highest  truth  is 
supernatural;  that  it  is  through  intuition  rather  than 
reason  that  we  may  hope  to  approach  our  highest 
aspirations. 

Harnack  has  well  said  that  Neoplatonism,  however 
lofty  and  inspiring  in  some  of  its  aspects,  impUed 
nothing  less  than  intellectual  bankruptcy.  "  The  con- 
tempt for  reason  and  science  (for  these  are  contemned 
when  relegated  to  a  second  place)  finally  leads  to 
barbarism,  because  it  results  in  crass  superstition,  and 
is  exposed  to  all  manner  of  imposture.  And,  as  a 
matter  of  fact,  barbarism  succeeded  the  flourishing 
period  of  Neoplatonism.  .  .  .  The  masses  grew  up 
in  superstition,  and  the  Christian  Church,  which  en- 
tered on  the  inheritance  of  Neoplatonism,  was  com- 
pelled to  reckon  with  this  and  come  to  terms  with  it. 
Just  when  the  bankruptcy  of  the  ancient  civilization 
and  its  lapse  into  barbarism  could  not  have  failed  to 
reveal  themselves,  a  kindly  destiny  placed  on  the  stage 
of  European  history  certain  barbarian  nations,  for 
whom  the  work  of  a  thousand  years  had  as  yet  no 
existence.  Thus  the  fact  is  obscured,  though  it  does 
not  escape  the  eye  of  one  who  looks  below  the 
surface,  that  the  ancient  world  must  necessarily  have 
degenerated  into  barbarism  of  its  own  accord,  because 
of  its  renunciation  of  this  world.  There  was  no  longer 
any  desire  either  to  enjoy  it,  to  master  it,  or  to  know 
it  as  it  really  is.    A  new  world  had  been  disclosed  for 


REFLECTIONS  ON  INTELLECTUAL  HISTORY     113 

which  everything  in  this  world  was  to  be  given  up,  and 
men  were  ready  to  sacrifice  insight  and  understanding, 
in  order  to  possess  that  other  world  with  certainty. 
In  the  light  which  radiated  from  the  world  to  come, 
that  which  in  this  world  appeared  absurd  became 
wisdom,  and  wisdom  became  folly."  * 

It  was  Just  at  this  period  that  historical  Christianity 
received  its  formulation  in  the  works  of  the  church 
fathers.  It  is  suggestive  that  the  greatest  of  these, 
Augustine,  had  been  attracted  both  by  the  teachings 
of  the  Persian,  Manes,  and  by  the  seductions  of  Neo- 
platonism.  The  "Christian  Epic,"  as  Santayana  has 
happily  termed  it,  formed  the  basis  for  a  new  intellec- 
tual life  which  developed  in  an  emotional  milieu  as 
different  as  possible  from  that  of  Athens  in  the  fifth 
century  before  Christ.  The  new  thought  was  able 
to  take  up  certain  ideal  and  mystic  elements  which 
may  clearly  be  perceived  in  Plato,  but  it  had  no  taste 
for  the  promising  contributions  to  an  exact  knowledge 
of  the  world  which  had  been  made  by  Democritus  and 
the  Epicureans,  who  accepted  his  mechanistic  view  of 
the  universe,  by  Aristotle  in  his  recorded  observations, 
and  by  those  scientists  of  the  Alexandrian  period,  such 
as  Aristarchus,  Hipparchus,  and  Archimedes,  who 
might,  had  their  spirit. and  methods  prevailed,  have 
earlier  developed  that  natural  science  which  is  the  boast 
of  our  own  day.  The  intellectual  life  as  it  had  been 
lived  in  all  its  freshness  by  the  contemporaries  of 

»  History  of  Dogma,  Vol.  I,  pp.  337-338. 
1 


114  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

Socrates  was  bound  to  result  eventually  in  disappoint- 
ment. It  was  too  exclusively  intellectual ;  it  sought 
truth  in  purely  intellectual  operations  and  clarification. 
It  rarely  touched  concretely  upon  the  social  and  eco- 
nomic problems  which  oppress  us  to-day,  and  it  failed 
to  recognize  the  significance  of  painstaking  scientific 
research  or  to  perceive  the  possibility  of  applying  the 
resulting  knowledge  of  the  natural  world,  organic  and 
inorganic,  to  practical  ends. 

In  this  respect  the  scholastic  revival  of  the  twelfth 
and  thirteenth  centuries  is  characteristically  Hellenic 
in  spirit.  It  is  true  that  by  that  time  authority  was 
assigned  an  overwhelming  importance,  whereas  the 
Athenians,  previous  to  Aristotle's  time,  had  been  al- 
most free  from  this  embarrassment,  Thomas  Aquinas 
operated  with  different  materials  from  Plato  and  gave 
his  thought  a  different  form,  but  the  general  intellec- 
tual affinity  between  the  two  men  is  apparent  enough. 

By  the  end  of  the  twelfth  century  the  first  univer- 
sities were  established.  Theology  became  a  subject 
of  systematic  instruction  based  upon  the  convenient 
outline  of  patristic  opinion  furnished  by  Peter  Lom- 
bard's Sentences.  With  the  reintroduction  of  Aris- 
totle's works  in  a  defective  Latin  translation,  the  older 
study  of  the  Seven  Liberal  Arts  in  the  meager  epitomes 
which  had  come  down  from  earlier  centuries  was  re- 
placed by  lectures  on  all  the  chief  works  of  the  most 
masterly  exponent  of  Greek  thought.  If  we  exclude 
law  and  medicine,  the  two  great  preoccupations  of 


REFLECTIONS  ON  INTELLECTUAL  HISTORY      115 

the  intellectual  class  in  western  Europe  in  the  thir- 
teenth century  were,  accordingly,  the  highly  elaborated 
Christian  theology,  in  all  its  subtle  ramifications,  on 
the  one  hand,  and,  on  the  other,  Aristotle's  logical 
treatises,  his  Ethics,  Physics,  Metaphysics,  De  Anima, 
and  the  minor  works  on  natural  phenomena,  as  they 
were  understood  by  the  ecclesiastical  commentators  of 
the  time.  With  their  own  observations  the  schoolmen 
combined  those  of  the  Arabic  philosophers,  who  had 
known  and  studied  Aristotle,  above  all  of  Averroes. 
The  Arabs  were,  however,  rather  more  remote  from 
the  real  Aristotle  than  Albertus  Magnus  and  Thomas 
Aquinas,  for  their  Arabic  translations  had  passed 
through  Syriac  on  the  way  from  the  Greek.  So,  as 
Renan  humorously  says  of  Averroes'  commentary, 
the  western  imiversities  prayerfully  studied  for  cen- 
turies a  Latin  translation,  of  a  Hebrew  translation, 
of  an  Arabic  commentator  on  an  Arabic  translation, 
of  a  Syriac  translation  of  a  Greek  philosopher.  Even 
supposing  that  the  Latin  translations  of  Aristotle  were 
as  perfect  as  translations  can  be,  there  was  httle  chance 
that  the  thirteenth-century  thinker  could  possibly 
transcend  all  the  obstacles  that  lay  in  the  way  of 
understanding  a  Greek  philosopher  of  the  fourth 
century  before  Christ.  The  revival  of  Aristotle, 
instead  of  rectifying  the  deficient  perspective  of  the 
earlier  Middle  Ages  and  supplying  knowledge  which 
would  serve  as  a  starting-point  for  further  progress, 
only   added   one   more  obstacle   to  a   fimdamental 


Il6  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

readjustment  of  thought.  It  enhanced  rather  than 
weakened  the  respect  for  authority,  discouraged  rather 
than  promoted  the  search  for  fresh  truth. 

During  the  fifteenth  century  Greek  was  once  more 
revived  in  Italy.  The  language  had  nearly  died 
out  in  the  West  about  the  year  500,  and  Boethius  had 
made  an  unsuccessful  attempt  to  perpetuate  a  knowl- 
edge of  the  chief  Greek  writers  by  translating  them  into 
Latin,  since  obviously  all  knowledge  of  Greek  works 
was  boimd  to  vanish  so  soon  as  the  knowledge  of  the 
language  formerly  possessed  by  educated  Romans 
disappeared.  For  several  centuries  before  Chryso- 
lorus  began  to  teach  Greek  to  a  group  of  eager  disciples 
in  Florence  in  1396,  we  find  few  allusions  to  Greek 
works.  While  the  names  of  Homer  and  Plato  were 
not  forgotten,  the  scholars  of  the  twelfth  century  rarely 
knew  of  the  existence  of  iEschylus  or  Sophocles,  of 
Herodotus  or  Thucydides.  The  Hiraianists  of  the 
fifteenth  century  devoted  themselves  to  rediscovering 
every  vestige  of  Greek  literature  that  could  be  found, 
as  well  as  such  Latin  writers  as  Tacitus  and  Lucretius, 
who  had  been  forgotten.  They  translated  the  Greek 
books  into  Latin,  and  thus  rendered  current  in  intellec- 
tual circles  those  works  that  still  remain  to  us  from 
classical  antiquity. 

It  is,  however,  a  grave  mistake  to  assume  that  this 
renewed  interest  in  the  Greek  and  Roman  authors  be- 
tokened a  revival  of  Hellenism,  as  has  commonly  been 
supposed.    The  libraries  described  by  Vespasiano,  a 


REFLECTIONS  ON  INTELLECTUAL  HISTORY      117 

Florentine  bookseller  of  the  fifteenth  century,  indi- 
cate the  least  possible  discrimination  on  the  part  of 
his  patrons.  Ficino,  the  translator  of  Plato,  was  an 
enthusiastic  Neoplatonist,  and  to  Pico  della  Mirandola 
the  Jewish  Cabbala  seemed  to  promise  infinite  enlight- 
enment. In  short,  Plato  was  as  incapable  in  the  fif- 
teenth century  of  producing  an  intellectual  revolution 
as  Aristotle  had  been  in  the  thirteenth.  With  the 
exception  of  Valla,  whose  critical  powers  were  perhaps 
slightly  stimulated  by  acquaintance  with  the  classics, 
it  must  be  confessed  that  there  was  little  in  the  so- 
caUed  "New  Learning"  to  generate  any  thing  approach- 
ing an  era  of  criticism.  It  is  difficult,  to  be  sure,  to 
imagine  a  Macchiavelli  or  an  Erasmus  in  the  thirteenth 
century,  but  it  is  likewise  diflScult  to  determine  the 
numerous  and  subtle  changes  which  made  them  pos- 
sible at  the  opening  of  the  sixteenth;  and  it  is  reckless 
to  assume  that  the  Humanists  were  chiefly  responsible 
for  these  changes. 

The  defection  of  the  Protestants  from  the  Roman 
Catholic  Church  is  not  connected  with  any  decisive  in- 
tellectual revision.  Such  ardent  emphasis  has  been 
constantly  placed  upon  the  differences  between  Protes- 
tantism and  Catholicism  by  representatives  of  both 
parties  that  the  close  intellectual  resemblance  of  the 
two  systems,  indeed  their  identity  in  nine  parts  out  of 
ten,  has  tended  to  escape  us.  The  early  Protestants,  of 
course,  accepted,  as  did  the  Catholics,  the  whole  patris- 
tic outlook  on  the  world ;  their  historical  perspective 


Il8  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

was  similar,  their  notions  of  the  origin  of  man,  of  the 
Bible,  with  its  types,  prophecies,  and  miracles,  of 
heaven  and  hell,  of  demons  and  angels,  are  all  identical. 
To  the  early  Protestants,  as  to  Catholics,  he  who  would 
be  saved  must  accept  the  doctrine  of  the  triune  God 
and  must  be  ever  on  his  guard  against  the  whisperings 
of  reason  and  the  innovations  suggested  by  scientific 
advance.  Luther  and  Melanchthon  denounced  Co- 
pernicus in  the  name  of  the  Bible.  Melanchthon  re- 
edited,  with  enthusiastic  approval,  Ptolemy's  astrology. 
Luther  made  repeated  and  bitter  attacks  upon  reason ; 
in  whose  eyes  he  freely  confessed  the  presuppositions 
of  Christianity  to  be  absurd.  Calvin  gloried  in  man's 
initial  and  inherent  moral  impotency;  and  the  doc- 
trine of  predestination  seemed  calculated  to  paralyze 
all  human  effort. 

The  Protestants  did  not  know  any  more  about  nature 
than  their  Catholic  enemies ;  they  were  just  as  com- 
pletely victimized  by  the  demonology  of  Witchcraft. 
The  Protestant  Revolt  was  not  begotten  of  added 
scientific  knowledge,  nor  did  it  owe  its  success  to  any 
considerable  confidence  in  criticism.  As  Gibbon 
pointed  out,  the  loss  of  one  conspicuous  mystery  — 
that  of  transubstantiation  —  "was  amply  compensated 
by  the  stupendous  doctrines  of  original  sin,  redemption, 
faith,  grace,  and  predestination"  which  the  Protestants 
strained  from  the  epistles  of  St.  Paul.  Early  Protes- 
tantism is,  from  an  intellectual  standpoint,  essentially 
a  phase  of  medieval  religious  history. 


REFLECTIONS  ON  INTELLECTUAL  HISTORY      119 

m 

Before  the  end  of  the  sixteenth  century,  however, 
Montaigne  reveals  an  unmistakable  Hellenic  urbanity, 
which  awakens  one  to  the  deficiencies  and  disappoint- 
ments of  the  so-called  Renaissance.  He  does  not  rise 
to  the  mystic  heights  of  Plato,  but  vies  with  him  in 
his  complete  freedom  from  dogma  and  authority,  and 
in  the  tentativeness  and  humanity  of  his  conclusions. 

At  last,  with  the  opening  of  the  seventeenth  century, 
the  beginnings  of  that  intellectual  revolution  which  is 
carrying  us  far  beyond  the  limits  of  Greek  thought 
are  clearly  apparent.  To  one  man  in  especial  we  owe 
the  first  statement  of  the  main  aspects  of  the  change. 
Lord  Bacon,  in  his  Advancement  of  Learning,  and  later 
in  his  Organon,  discusses  with  great  acumen  the  ob- 
stacles which  he  in  the  way  of  progress,  and  the  methods 
of  overcoming  them.  He  saw  far  more  clearly  than 
any  of  his  contemporaries,  or,  at  any  rate,  expressed  in 
a  far  more  effective  way,  the  prospects  of  scientific 
discovery  and  its  application  to  the  betterment  of 
man's  estate.  He  analyzed  the  nature  of  authority 
and  pointed  out  its  dangers.  He  foresaw  an  infinite 
vista  of  possibilities  in  the  accumulation  of  new  knowl- 
edge about  man  and  the  world  through  experimental 
scientific  research.  In  his  ideal  commonwealth,  the 
New  Atlantis,  he  provides  an  academy  of  science  to 
which  he  assigns  the  most  prominent  place,  and  he 
dwells  at  great  length  upon  its  elaborate  equipment. 


I20  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

To  him  knowledge  was  above  all  dynamic  and  pro- 
gressive, and  in  his  works  our  modern  idea  of  human 
progress  first  appears  in  unmistakable  form.  It  is 
quite  true  that  he  was  not  himself  destined  to  make 
any  considerable  contribution  to  natural  science,  nor 
did  he  appreciate  the  contributions  which  his  con- 
temporaries, such  as  Galileo  and  Harvey,  were  making. 
He  even  refused  to  accept  the  Copernican  theory  of 
the  solar  system,  and  exhibits,  moreover,  at  times  a 
highly  naive  reliance  upon  authority;  all  of  which 
only  proves  the  great  difficulty  of  making  a  sudden 
break  with  the  past,  however  good  one's  intentions 
may  be. 

Descartes  went  much  farther  in  his  distrust  of 
authority  than  Bacon.  As  is  well  known,  he  believed 
that  a  complete  system  of  knowledge  could  be  created 
de  novo,  by  observing  the  methods  which  he  prescribed 
in  the  search  for  truth.  His  Essa'  de  la  Methode  is 
fundamentally  a  declaration  of  complete  independence 
of  the  past  and  a  repudiation  of  the  medieval  attitude 
of  mind.  Like  Bacon  and  Gahleo,  he  ventured  to 
write  his  most  profound  thoughts  in  his  own  native 
tongue,  thus  recognizing  that  the  intellectual  class  was 
no  longer  confined  to  those  who  had  mastered  Latin. 

Descartes's  plan  of  emptying  his  mind  and  starting 
over  again  certainly  marks  an  epoch  in  philosophic 
thought;  but,  as  might  have  been  anticipated,  the 
moment  that  he  permitted  his  mind  to  refill  itself, 
the  ideas  that  poured  in  were  mainly  old  ones.    Un- 


REFLECTIONS  ON  INTELLECTUAL  HISTORY      121 

consciously,  indeed,  he  merely  found  a  new  excuse 
for  reinstalling  a  great  part  of  his  ancient  intellectual 
furniture.  Just  as  Bacon's  new  method  of  reaching 
truth  failed  to  free  him  from  old  errors,  so  Descartes, 
in  his  initial  anxiety  to  prove  the  existence  of  God, 
showed  a  strongly  conservative  tendency.  Never- 
theless, he  and  Bacon  scotched  authority,  although 
they  had  not  the  heart  to  kill  it,  and  the  unprecedented 
intellectual  clarification,  accompanied  by  an  unprece- 
dented accumulation  of  facts  in  regard  to  man  and  his 
environment,  which  succeeding  centuries  have  wit- 
nessed is  largely  due  to  the  attitude  of  mind  which 
Bacon  and  Descartes  encouraged. 

During  the  seventeenth  century  there  was  a  general 
awakening  of  a  bold,  critical  spirit  which  had  been  im- 
known  in  western  Europe  since  the  disappearance  of 
the  skeptics  in  the  later  Roman  Empire.  This  is  par- 
ticularly conspicuous  in  matters  which  had  received 
a  religious  sanction.  A  theory  of  tolerance  was  de- 
veloped by  Locke  and  others;  miracles  became  a 
stumbUng-block ;  Spinoza  outUned  a  system  of  higher 
criticism  in  dealing  with  the  Old  Testament;  Pierre 
Bayle  scrutinized  somewhat  unsympathetically  the 
records  of  religious  heroes,  such  as  David  and  Augus- 
tine; and  before  the  end  of  the  seventeenth  century 
the  first  chapters  of  Genesis  had  become  the  subjects 
of  playful  exegesis  in  the  hands  of  Dr.  Burnet  and 
Charles  Blount.  Herbert  of  Cherbury,  in  his  Ancient 
Religion  of  the  Gentiles,  had  earlier  laid  the  f  oimdations 


122  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

for  the  study  of  comparative  religion  and  protested 
against  the  idea  that  God  proposed  to  damn  the 
greater  portion  of  mankind.  Newton's  proof  that 
our  terrestrial  laws  of  motion  extend  throughout  the 
universe  made  a  far  more  profound  impression  than 
the  writings  of  Copernicus,  and  the  eighteenth-century 
Deists  never  tired  of  praising  a  God  of  immutable  law. 
The  bases  of  modern  astronomy,  physics,  botany, 
zoology,  and  mathematics  were  all  laid  before  the 
middle  of  the  eighteenth  century,  and  by  that  time 
the  knowledge  in  all  these  subjects  greatly  transcended, 
in  its  extent  and  precision,  anything  known  to  the 
Greeks  and  Romans.  The  diabolical  superstitions 
associated  with  witchcraft,  which,  it  must  be  remem- 
bered, were  based  upon  the  Bible  and  classical  authors, 
finally  gave  way,  and  the  new  spirit  of  unfettered  criti- 
cism and  the  confidence  in  experimental  science  and 
its  applications  which  it  had  begotten  —  which  were 
ever  reenforcing  the  conception  of  progress  and  were 
ever  weakening  the  authority  of  the  past  —  fur- 
nished the  necessary  preliminaries  for  a  new  series  of 
achievements. 

IV 

This  sketch  of  intellectual  history  down  to  the  mid- 
dle of  the  eighteenth  century  should  put  us  in  a  position 
to  reach  some  general  conclusions  in  regard  to  the 
main  peculiarities  of  our  present  outlook.     It  is  con- 


REFLECTIONS  ON  INTELLECTUAL  HISTORY      123 

ceded  even  by  the  most  intrepid  Hellenic  enthusiasts 
that,  as  we  compare  our  own  with  earlier  periods, 
there  can  be  no  doubt  that  there  is  a  large  element  of 
novelty  in  the  present  situation.  Nobody  questions 
that  in  such  matter  as  locomotives,  sewing  machines, 
steam  threshers,  telephones,  and  arc  lights  our  age 
is  one  unparalleled  in  the  past.  There  is,  however, 
still  a  very  common  feeUng,  especially  among  men  of 
the  highest  degree  of  hterary  and  artistic  cultivation, 
that  our  advance  beyond  the  Greeks  in  art  and  litera- 
ture is  somewhat  questionable,  and  with  this  goes  the 
suspicion  that  the  Greeks  exhibited  practically  all 
the  varieties  of  intellectual  activity  which  we  now 
witness,  that  here  and  there  they  forecast  almost  all 
of  our  fundamental  scientific  discoveries,  and  that 
their  ideals  of  the  intellectual  life  were  equal,  if  not 
superior,  to  anything  to  which  man  has  since  attained. 
It  seems  to  the  writer  that  this  suspicion  is  the  re- 
sult of  a  failure  to  realize  certain  fundamental  novelties 
which  underlie  the  characteristic  thought  of  our  own 
time.  At  least  five  such  novelties  appear  to  be  rather 
easily  distinguishable.  Two  of  them  have  already  been 
mentioned  :  (i)  Experimental  science,  which  engages 
in  a  minute  observation  of  natural  phenomena  aided 
by  instruments  adapted  to  the  purpose,  and  verified 
by  experimentation,  is  essentially  a  product  of  modem 
times.  The  Greeks  had  no  telescopes,  nor  microscopes, 
nor  thermometers,  nor  spectroscopes.  Their  knowl- 
edge was  at  best  the  result  of  what  would  seem  to  us 


124 


THE  NEW  HISTORY' 


crude  and  haphazard  observation  which  tended  to 
take  the  form  of  accepted  authority.  Why,  the  Scho- 
lastics would  have  asked,  is  it  necessary  to  see  whether 
a  heavy  body  falls  more  rapidly  than  a  light  one,  since 
Aristotle  has  told  us  that  it  does  ?  Then  in  the  second 
place,  (2)  our  modern  idea  of  progress  through  the  con- 
tinual discovery  of  new  knowledge  and  the  improve- 
ment of  man's  condition  is  one  that  does  not  appear 
clearly  among  the  Greeks  and  Romans. 

Into  the  thought  of  the  nineteenth  century,  three 
additional  elements  entered :  — 

(3)  In  some  inexplicable  way  there  has  come  a 
respect  for,  and  appreciation  of,  the  common  man,  a 
sohcitude  for  his  welfare,  and  a  willingness  to  permit 
him  to  share  in  the  control  of  public  affairs.  These 
together  constitute  what  may  be  called  the  democratic 
spirit.  So  long  as  slavery  or  serfdom  existed,  as  they 
did  down  until  recent  times,  the  democratic  spirit  was 
impossible.  It  is  this  appreciation  of  the  common 
man  which  is  reflected  in  our  development  of  social 
sciences,  undreamed  of  by  the  Greeks,  and  in  the 
socializing  of  older  subjects,  such  as  psychology  and 
ethics.  Political  economy  was  born  in  the  eighteenth 
century;  in  the  nineteenth  anthropology  developed 
on  a  large  scale,  together  with  the  comparative  study 
of  religions,  sociology,  and  social  psychology. 

(4)  The  tendency  to  occupy  this  social  point  of  view 
has  been  greatly  increased  by  another  new  factor,  the 
Industrial  Revolution,  with  all  its  attendant  circum- 


REFLECTIONS  ON  INTELLECTUAL  HISTORY     12$ 

stances.  By  the  Industrial  Revolution  is,  of  course, 
meant  the  fundamental  change  in  our  methods  of 
economic  production  and  organization  due  to  the  de- 
velopment of  machinery  and  the  factory  system.  At 
first  sight  these  matters  would  seem  remote  from  the 
life  of  the  intellect.  Why  should  our  general  view  of 
the  world  be  materially  affected  by  new  ways  of  spin- 
ning and  weaving  and  more  efficient  methods  of 
manufacturing  boots  and  shoes  ?  Simply  because  it 
suggests  hitherto  imsuspected  possibilities  of  social  re- 
adjustment and  the  promotion  of  human  happiness,  — 
two  of  the  most  engaging  subjects  of  modem  specu- 
lation. As  Robert  Owen  pointed  out,  our  increased 
capacity  of  production  through  machinery  is  equiva- 
lent to  vastly  increasing  the  niunber  of  workers  in  the 
world  without  any  increase  of  the  number  of  persons 
to  be  cared  for.  If,  in  a  manufacturing  town  of 
twenty  thousand  inhabitants,  modem  machinery 
permits  an  output  which  formerly  would  have  re- 
quired two  himdred  thousand  workers,  each  individual 
will  have,  on  the  average,  nine  helpers  in  providing 
the  necessities  and  material  amenities  of  life. 
Hitherto  the  Industrial  Revolution  has,  from  the 
standpoint  of  the  common  man,  been  distinctly 
disappointing  in  its  results.  For  a  variety  of  reasons, 
which  it  is  impossible  to  enumerate  here,  the  work 
done  by  his  helpers  appears  to  profit  him  very  little. 
Nevertheless,  the  intellect  has  perhaps  never  had  a 
more  exhilarating  problem  set  before  it  than  the  pos- 


126  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

sibilities  of  readjustment  implied  in   the   economic 
revolution. 

We  owe,  moreover,  to  the  Industrial  Revolution  the 
development  of  our  cities,  and  city  life  has  always  been 
closely  associated  with  intellectual  changes,  so  that  we 
are  justified  in  assuming  that  the  vast  extension  of 
our  urban  interests  must  ultimately  deeply  affect  our 
speculations.  Associated  with  these  same  economic 
changes  is  the  development  of  world-commerce  and  of 
incredibly  efficient  means  of  communication,  which 
have  brought  mankind  together  throughout  the  whole 
earth  in  a  spirit  of  competition,  emulation,  and  co- 
operation. It  will  not  be  many  years  before  every  one 
on  the  face  of  the  globe  can  read  and  write  and  be  in 
a  position  through  our  means  of  intercommunication 
to  follow  the  course  of  events  in  every  portion  of  the 
earth.  This  astonishing  condition  of  affairs  suggests 
boundless  possibilities  of  human  brotherhood.  A  few 
years  ago,  at  an  International  Postal  Congress,  as  I 
recollect,  a  proposition  was  made  that  the  charge  for  a 
letter  between  almost  any  two  points  on  the  surface  of 
the  globe  be  reduced  to  two  cents.  This  was  advocated 
by  Egypt,  the  United  States,  and  New  Zealand.  This 
proposition  and  those  who  supported  it,  representing 
at  once  the  land  of  the  oldest  civiHzation  and,  on  the 
opposite  side  of  the  globe,  that  of  the  newest,  ought 
sufficiently  to  free  us  from  the  idea  that  our  specu- 
lation can  be  limited  to  the  bounds  which  circum- 
scribed that  of  the  Greeks. 


REFLECTIONS  ON  INTELLECTUAL  HISTORY      127 

(5)  Reenforcing  all  these  tendencies  is  the  modern 
evolutionary  view.  The  discovery,  known  as  evolu- 
tion, that  all  things  come  about  gradually  and  that 
one  thing  grows  out  of  another,  has  perhaps  done 
more  than  any  other  new  element  in  our  thought  to  dis- 
credit the  ways  of  thinking  that  prevailed  in  ancient 
Greece  and  among  the  Schoolmen  of  the  Middle  Ages. 
As  Professor  John  Dewey  has  pointed  out,  the  very 
words  "Origin  of  Species  "  chosen  by  Darwin  as  the 
title  of  his  book,  embody  a  general  intellectual  revolt 
against  the  earlier  assumptions,  and  a  new  intellectual 
temper,  the  full  significance  of  which  has  hitherto 
scarcely  been  reaHzed.  The  Greek  thinkers  were  not 
wholly  oblivious  to  the  development  of  the  world,  but 
they  knew  Httle  or  nothing  about  the  history  of  the 
globe  or  of  mankind,  and  in  general  believed  in  fixed 
kinds  of  things, — in  distinct  and  immutable  species,  — 
and  this  belief  received  the  religious  sanction  of  Chris- 
tian thinkers.  It  carried  with  it  as  a  natural  corollary 
"the  assumption  of  the  superiority  of  the  fixed  and 
final,"  and  regarded  "change  and  origin  as  signs  of 
defect  and  unreality."  "In  laying  hands  upon  the 
sacred  ark  of  absolute  permanency,"  Professor  Dewey 
continues,  "in  treating  the  forms  that  had  been  re- 
garded as  types  of  fixity  and  perfection  as  originating 
and  passing  away,  the  Origin  of  Species  introduced  a 
mode  of  thinking  that  in  the  end  was  bound  to  trans- 
form the  logic  of  knowledge,  and  hence  the  treatment 
of  morals,  politics,   and   religion."    Platonic  ideas, 


128  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

Aristotelian  essences,  the  Christian  dogma  of  special 
creation,  and  ''eternal  verities"  in  general  are  in- 
volved in  the  debacle.  "The  human  mind,  deliberately 
as  it  were,  exhausted  the  logic  of  the  changeless,  the 
final,  and  the  transcendent,  before  it  essayed  adven- 
ture on  the  pathless  wastes  of  generation  and  trans- 
formation." But  now  that  it  has  engaged  in  this 
novel  adventure  its  interest  inevitably  shifts  "from 
the  wholesale  essence  back  of  special  changes  to  the 
question  of  how  special  changes  serve  and  defeat  con- 
crete purposes ;  shifts  from  an  intelligence  that  shaped 
things  once  for  all  to  the  particular  intelligences  which 
things  are  even  now  shaping ;  shifts  from  an  ultimate 
goal  of  good  to  the  direct  increments  of  justice  and 
happiness  that  intelligent  administration  of  existent 
conditions  may  beget  and  that  present  carelessness 
or  stupidity  will  destroy  or  forego."  ^ 

This  evolutionary  way  of  thinking  is  the  inevitable 
result  of  the  highly  dynamic  age  in  which  we  live. 
Even  if  it  had  not  been  shown  by  paleontologists, 
botanists,  and  zoologists  that  the  now  existing  species 
of  plants  and  animals  had  developed  from  preexisting 
species,  the  older  philosophic  concepts  of  the  Greeks 
and  Schoolmen  must  have  ultimately  given  way  before 
the  general  advance  of  scientific  knowledge  and  the 
Industrial  Revolution.  The  botanists  and  zoologists 
and  the  prehistoric  archaeologists   have  furnished  us 

'  Dewey,  John,  The  Influence  of  Darwin  on  Philosophy  and  Oihet 
Essays  in  Contemporaneous  Thought,  1910,  pp.  1-19. 


REFLECTIONS  ON  INTELLECTUAL  HISTORY      12^ 

with  an  astonishing  and  satisfying  historical  example 
of  an  evolutionary  process,  but  even  without  this,  the 
older  philosophy  based  on  fixed  species  and  essences, 
and  relying  upon  Aristotehan  logic  as  an  efl5cient 
method  of  attaining  truth,  was  doomed.  The  dis- 
covery of  organic  evolution  was  the  culmination,  not 
the  beginning,  of  a  philosophical  revolution. 

In  view  of  what  has  been  said,  is  it  not  clear  that 
modem  thought  far  transcends  that  of  the  Greeks  in 
the  accimiulation  and  precision  of  the  data  on  which 
it  is  founded,  in  the  critical  and  historical  methods  of 
treating  and  interpreting  this  data,  in  the  rejection  of 
unsound  philosophical  assumptions  and  futile  antith- 
eses which  have  proved  a  serious  obstacle  in  the  path  of 
enlightenment,  and,  lastly,  in  the  ingenious  application 
of  knowledge  to  human  needs?  It  is  true  that  the 
Alexandrian  Greeks  received  from  Aristarchus  the  sug- 
gestion that  the  earth  revolved  on  its  axis  and  about 
the  sun,  from  Archimedes  and  Hero  illustrations  of 
important  mechanisms,  and  they  knew  of  the  Epicu- 
rean theory  (later  eloquently  reproduced  by  Lucretius) 
of  man's  slow  development,  hut  they  were  incapable  of 
appreciating  the  importance  of  any  of  these  suggestions. 
As  Professor  Dewey  says,  they  seemed  pledged  to  ex- 
haust the  logic  of  the  changeless,  the  final,  and  the 
transcendent,  and  consequently  their  game  was  bound 
to  be  played  out  sooner  or  later.  But  it  seems  as  if 
our  game  can  scarcely  be  played  to  an  end.  There  is 
no  reason  to  think  that  we  are  making  more  than  the 

K 


130  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

earliest  discoveries  and  the  crudest  applications  of 
knowledge  as  yet.  The  possibilities  of  fruitful  research 
seem  unlimited  and  the  influence  of  new  knowledge 
incalculable. 

We  have  learned  to  think  about  a  far  wider  range  of 
things  than  any  generation  which  has  preceded  us; 
we  have  learned  to  recognize  that  truth  is  not  merely 
relative,  as  was  clearly  enough  perceived  by  an  im- 
portant school  of  Greek  thought,  but  that  this  relativ- 
ity is  conditioned  by  our  constant  increase  in  knowl- 
edge. Cicero  declared  that  there  was  no  possible  view 
that  had  not  been  held  by  some  philosopher,  and  that 
it  was  the  part  of  the  wise  man  to  accept  the  opinion 
that  appeared  to  him  at  the  moment  the  most  plau- 
sible. While  there  is  much  in  Cicero's  skepticism  to 
admire,  we  should  now  state  our  pHght  in  quite  differ- 
ent terms.  Our  more  carefully  considered  opinions 
are  based  ultimately  upon  observed  facts  about  man 
and  his  environment.  With  our  ever  increasing 
knowledge  in  regard  to  these  facts,  our  opinions  must 
necessarily  change.  To  what  may  be  called  the  innate 
relativity  of  things,  perceived  by  the  Greeks,  we  have 
added  a  dynamic  relativity  which  is  the  result  of  rap- 
idly advancing  scientific  knowledge,  which  necessarily 
renders  all  our  conclusions  provisional. 

In  the  career  of  conscious  social  readjustment  upon 
which  mankind  is  now  embarked,  it  would  seem  as  if 
the  history  of  thought  should  play  a  very  important 
part,  for  social  changes  must  be  accompanied  by  emo- 


REFLECTIONS  ON  INTELLECTUAL  HISTORY      131 

tional  readjustments  and  determined  by  intellectual 
guidance.  The  history  of  thought  is  one  of  the  most 
potent  means  of  dissolving  the  bonds  of  prejudice  and 
the  restraints  of  routine.  It  not  only  enables  us  to 
reach  a  clear  perception  of  our  duties  and  responsi- 
bilities by  explaining  the  manner  in  which  existing 
problems  have  arisen,  but  it  promotes  that  intellectual 
liberty  upon  which  progress  fimdamentally  depends. 


HISTORY  FOR  THE  COMMON  MAN 


Should  a  student  of  the  past  be  asked  what  he  re- 
garded as  the  most  original  and  far-reaching  discovery 
of  modem  times,  he  might  reply  with  some  assurance 
that  it  is  our  growing  realization  of  the  fundamental 
importance  and  absorbing  interest  of  common  men 
and  common  things.  Our  democracy,  with  all  its 
hopes  and  aspirations,  is  based  on  an  appreciation  of 
common  men ;  our  science,  with  all  its  achievements 
and  prospects,  is  based  on  the  appreciation  of  common 
things.  It  is  impossible  to  pause  here  to  show  how 
very  true  this  is,  nor  is  it  needful  to  do  so,  for  we  all 
seem  to  recognize  its  truth  by  our  presence  here  to-day 
to  consider  the  particular  problem  before  us.^  We 
have  come  together  with  a  view  of  adjusting  our  edu- 
cation to  this  great  discovery.  It  is  our  present  busi- 
ness to  see  what  can  be  done  for  that  very  large  class 
of  boys  and  girls  who  must  take  up  the  burden  of  life 
prematurely  and  who  must  look  forward  to  earning 

*  Read  before  the  superintendents  of  schools  of  the  larger  cities  at 
the  meeting  of  the  National  Educational  Association  at  Indianapolis, 
March  2,  19 10.  The  general  subject  under  consideration  at  this 
meeting  was  Industrial  Education. 

133 


HISTORY  FOR  THE  COMMON  MAN  133 

their  livelihood  by  the  work  of  their  hands.  But  edu- 
cation has  not  been  wont  until  recently  to  reckon 
seriously  with  the  common  man  who  must  do  common 
things.  It  has  presupposed  leisure  and  freedom  from 
the  pressing  cares  of  life. 

This  conception  can  be  traced  back  to  the  Greeks, 
who  established  the  tradition  that  education  should 
be  "liberal "  and  based  on  "liberal  arts/'  by  which  they 
meant  those  studies  and  that  training  which  they  be- 
lieved appropriate  for  a  freeman  who  was  supported 
by  slaves  and  who  had  before  him  a  life  of  leisure. 
When  a  particular  study  suggested  in  any  way  prac- 
tical usefulness,  it  lost  forthwith  its  "liberal  "character, 
for  it  could  only  be  advantageous  to  a  slave.  It  has 
proved  very  difficult  to  get  away  from  this  long-cher- 
ished conception  of  education,  for  we  do  not  realize 
vividly  enough  the  changes  which  have  taken  place  since 
Aristotle  painted  his  portrait  of  the  "high-minded" 
man.  The  Greeks  had  neither  democracy  in  our  sense 
of  the  term,  nor  natural  science  as  we  understand  it, 
with  its  multiform  applications  to  life.  Slavery  has 
disappeared,  and  the  ancient  occupations  of  the  slave 
have  undergone  such  a  revolution,  have  been  so  di- 
versified and  shown  such  possibilities  of  improvement 
with  the  advance  of  scientific  discovery,  that  modern 
industry  bears  Httle  resemblance  to  the  simple  handi- 
crafts of  earlier  times.  Industry  has  become  exceed- 
ingly interesting  and  worthy.  We  have  no  right  to 
exclude  it  from  our  education  as  the  Greeks  did.    We 


134  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

have  no  excuse  for  continuing  to  harbor  their  prejudice 
against  the  practical,  and  must  not  permit  ourselves 
to  be  dominated  any  longer  by  their  notion  of  "  lib- 
eral"  as  something  which  must  be  kept  carefully  apart 
from  the  "useful."  It  is  high  time  that  we  set  to  work 
boldly  and  without  any  timid  reservations  to  bring 
our  education  into  the  closest  possible  relation  with  the 
actual  life  and  future  duties  of  the  great  majority  of 
those  who  fiU  our  public  schools. 

With  this  conviction  firmly  implanted  in  my  mind,  I 
propose  to  point  out  the  role  that  history  may  be 
made  to  play  in  the  education  of  boys  and  girls 
who  are  being  taught  to  manage  machinery  and  carry 
on  other  industrial  operations  with  the  immediate 
end  of  supporting  themselves.  When  I  first  began 
teaching  history,  I  must  admit  that  I  did  not  see  its 
uses  very  clearly.  This  was  due  largely  to  the  fact 
that  I  had  a  very  inadequate  notion  of  what  the  past 
of  mankind  really  means  for  us.  I  have  gradually 
come  to  realize  how  completely  we  are  dependent  on 
the  past  for  our  knowledge  and  our  ideals;  how  it 
alone  can  explain  why  we  are  what  we  are,  and  why  we 
do  as  we  do.  History  is  what  we  know  of  the  past. 
We  may  question  it  as  we  question  our  memory  of  our 
own  personal  acts  and  experiences.  But  those  things 
that  we  recall  in  our  own  past  vary  continually  with 
our  moods  and  preoccupations.  We  adjust  our  recol- 
lection to  our  needs  and  aspirations,  and  ask  from 
it  light  on   the  particular  problems  that  face  us. 


fflSTORY  FOR  THE  COMMON  MAN  135 

IBstory,  too,  is  in  this  sense  not  fixed  and  immutable, 
but  ever  changing.  Each  age  has  a  perfect  right  to 
select  from  the  annals  of  mankind  those  facts  that  seem 
to  have  a  particular  bearing  on  the  matters  it  has  at 
heart.  And  so  it  comes  about,  as  Maeterlinck  has 
pointed  out,  that,  with  increased  insight,  historic  facts 
"which  seemed  to  be  graven  forever  on  the  stone  and 
bronze  of  the  past  "wiU  assume  an  entirely  different 
aspect,  will  return  to  life  and  leap  into  movement, 
bringing  vaster  and  more  courageous  counsels." 

This  is  a  very  important  point,  and  I  am  anxious  to 
emphasize  it  before  I  go  on,  for  I  have  no  idea  of  recom- 
mending for  industrial  schools  the  particular  kind  of 
history  that  conmionly  goes  by  that  name,  since  it  is 
not  suitable  for  our  purposes.  There  are  no  clearly 
defined  "elements"  in  the  study  of  history,  as  there 
are  in  arithmetic.  Doubtless  those  who  prepare  our 
historical  manuals  believe  that  they  are  including 
the  most  important  things  that  have  happened,  just 
as  a  chemist  or  geologist  would  present  in  a  textbook 
the  elements  of  his  particular  branch  of  natural  sci- 
ence. The  case  of  history  is,  however,  quite  peculiar, 
for  it  has  to  do  with  the  most  diverse  and  heterogeneous 
matters,  and  not,  like  chemistry,  with  a  pretty  well- 
defined  class  of  phenomena.  Our  so-called  standard 
works  on  history  deal  at  length  with  kings  and  popes, 
with  courtiers  and  statesmen,  with  wars  waged  for 
territory  or  thrones,  with  laws  passed  by  princes 
and  parliaments.    But  these  matters  form  only  a  very 


136  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

small  part  of  history,  for  the  historian  may  elect  to 
describe  a  Roman  villa  or  a  primitive  steam  engine,  or 
contrast  the  theology  of  Luther  with  that  of  St. 
Thomas  Aquinas;  he  can  trace  the  origin  of  Gothic 
architecture  or  of  the  Egyptian  calendar,  portray  the 
infatuation  of  Henry  VIII  for  Anne  Boleyn,  or  Bis- 
marck's attitude  toward  the  socialists,  or  the  hatchets 
of  neolithic  man.  This  Hst  of  illustrations  but  feebly 
suggests  the  range  and  inexhaustible  variety  of  man's 
interests  and  achievements.  Some  of  these  things  are 
usually  included  in  our  textbooks,  some  are  not. 

What  assurance  have  we  that,  from  the  boundless 
wealth  of  the  past,  the  most  important  and  pertinent 
of  the  experiences  of  mankind  have  been  sifted  out 
and  brought  into  due  prominence  by  those  who  popu- 
larize history  and  squeeze  it  into  such  compendious 
forms  as  they  believe  best  adapted  to  the  instruction 
of  youth  ?  I  think  that  we  have  no  such  assurance. 
Voltaire  long  ago  pronounced  history  to  be  simply  a 
tale  that  we  have  agreed  upon  —  une  fable  convenue. 
He  is  right ;  each  new  writer  of  a  textbook  is  guided, 
consciously  or  unconsciously,  in  his  choice  of  topics  by 
earlier  manuals  which  have  established  what  teachers 
and  the  public  at  large  are  wont  to  expect  under  the 
caption  "history." 

Until  recently  the  main  thread  selected  was  politi- 
cal. Almost  everything  was  classified  under  kings' 
reigns ;  and  the  policy  of  their  governments  and  the 
wars  in  which  they  became  involved  were  the  favorite 


HISTORY  FOR  THE  COMMON  MAN  137 

subjects  of  discussion.  This  is  a  venerable  tradition 
established  by  the  Greek  and  Roman  historians, 
Thucydides,  Polybius,  Livy,  Tacitus.  Political  his- 
tory is  the  easiest  kind  of  history  to  write ;  it  lends 
itself  to  accurate  chronological  arrangement,  just  be- 
cause it  deals  mainly  with  events  rather  than  with 
conditions.  It  must,  moreover,  have  seemed  more 
important  to  readers  when  kings  and  courts  were  far 
more  conspicuous  than  they  now  are,  and  when  fight- 
ing was  regarded  as  the  one  unmistakably  genteel 
pursuit  of  the  leisure  classes.  Some  writers  justified 
it  on  the  ground  that  this  kind  of  history  served  as  a 
guide  to  generals  and  statesmen  who,  by  studying  the 
past,  might  learn  better  to  conduct  an  army  to  victory 
or  guide  the  ship  of  state  in  the  dangerous  waters  of 
civil  commotion  or  foreign  aggression. 

It  is  clear  that  our  interests  are  changing,  and  conse- 
quently the  kind  of  questions  that  we  ask  the  past  to 
answer.  Our  most  recent  manuals  venture  to  leave 
out  some  of  the  traditional  facts  least  appropriate  for 
an  elementary  review  of  the  past  and  endeavor  to 
bring  their  narrative  into  relation,  here  and  there, 
with  modem  needs  and  demands.  But  I  think  that 
this  process  of  eliminating  the  old  and  substituting 
the  new  might  be  carried  much  farther ;  that  our  best 
manuals  are  still  crowded  with  facts  that  are  not  worth 
while  bringing  to  the  attention  of  our  boys  and  girls 
and  that  they  still  omit  in  large  measure  those  things 
that  are  best  worth  telling. 


138  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

In  order  to  make  the  situation  quite  clear,  let  us 
imagine  that  some  broad-minded  and  sympathetic 
spirit,  deeply  impressed  with  the  tasks  that  face  us 
to-day,  —  like  Maeterlinck  himself,  for  instance,  — 
had  managed  to  learn  a  great  deal  about  the  past  of 
mankind  without  ever  looking  into  a  standard  history 
or  an  historical  manual  great  or  small;  that  he  had 
been  guided  miraculously  to  the  real  sources  of  his- 
torical knowledge  and  had  familiarized  himself  with 
all  the  vestiges  of  the  past  thought  and  activities  of 
mankind,  not  only  the  written  records,  but  the  re- 
mains of  buildings,  pictures,  clothing,  tools,  and  orna- 
ments. Let  us  suppose,  then,  that  he  undertook  to 
prepare  a  book  for  children,  in  which  he  proposed  to 
tell  them  what  he  believed  would  be  most  interesting 
to  them,  and  most  illuminating,  as  they  grew  up  and 
began  to  play  their  respective  parts  in  social  life. 
Would  he  dream  of  including  the  battle  of  ^Egospotami, 
the  Samnite  wars,  the  siege  of  Numantia  by  the  Ro- 
mans, the  crimes  of  Nero,  the  Italian  campaigns  of 
Frederick  Barbarossa,  the  six  wives  of  Henry  VIII,  or 
the  battles  of  the  Thirty  Years'  War?  It  is  toler- 
ably safe  to  say  that  none  of  these  things,  which  our 
manuals  always  include,  would  even  occur  to  him  as  he 
thought  over  all  that  man  had  done  and  thought  and 
suffered  and  dreamed  through  thousands  of  years. 

Our  writer,  not  being  especially  interested  in  battles 
and  sieges  or  the  conduct  of  kings,  and  having  no  idea 
of  teaching  his  readers  how  to  be  good  generals  and 


HISTORY  FOR  THE  COMMON  MAN  139 

statesmen,  would  in  all  probability  select  some  other 
thread  for  his  narrative  than  the  old  political  one.  He 
might  decide  that  what  men  knew  of  the  world,  or 
what  they  believed  to  be  their  duty,  or  what  they  made 
with  their  hands,  or  the  nature  and  style  of  their  build- 
ings, whether  private  or  public,  were  far  more  sug- 
gestive to  us  than  their  rulers  at  particular  times  or 
the  wars  that  they' waged.  So  in  considering  the  place 
to  be  assigned  to  history  in  industrial  education,  I  have 
no  intention,  as  I  have  already  said,  of  advocating 
what  has  hitherto  commonly  passed  for  an  outline  of 
history.  On  the  contrary,  I  suggest  that  we  take  up 
the  whole  problem  afresh,  freed  for  the  moment  from 
our  impressions  of  ''history"  vulgarly  so-called. 

Let  us  begin  by  asking  ourselves  what,  considering 
the  needs,  capacity,  interests,  and  future  career  of  the 
boys  and  girls  in  industrial  schools,  is  it  most  necessary 
for  them  to  know  of  the  past  in  order  to  be  as  intelli- 
gent, efficient,  and  happy  as  possible  in  the  life  they 
must  lead  and  the  work  they  must  do  ?  In  order  to 
answer  this  question  intelligently,  we  must  first  de- 
termine the  position  in  which  the  pupils  are  placed, 
and  the  nature  of  the  demands  which  their  special  kind 
of  education  imposes.  Secondly,  I  propose  to  give 
some  illustrations  of  those  things  in  the  social  memory 
of  mankind  which  are  most  essential  for  them  to  know 
and  recall  from  time  to  time,  and  which  I  venture  to 
think  will  prove  more  enlightening  than  any  other 
information  that  can  be  given  them. 


140  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

n 

Industrial  education  is,  of  course,  a  form  of  technical 
education.  Its  most  obvious  immediate  aim  is  to 
prepare  boys  and  girls,  thirteen  to  sixteen  years  old, 
to  become  skillful  operatives  as  promptly  as  may  be. 
With  this  technical  training  we  are  not  here  con- 
cerned. But  industrial  training  may  aspire  to  do 
much  more  than  turn  out  efficient  artisans  who  will 
satisfy  their  employers,  and  who  will  command 
higher  wages  and  be  eligible  to  a  more  rapid  promo- 
tion than  the  imtrained  —  fundamental  as  all  this  is. 
The  industrial  class  is  a  very  large  one  indeed,  and  it 
is  obviously  of  the  greatest  moment  to  society  that 
this  class  should  be  recruited  from  those  who  have 
been  taught  to  see  the  significance  of  their  humble 
part  in  carrying  on  the  world's  work,  to  appreciate  the 
possibilities  of  their  position,  and  to  view  it  in  as  hope- 
ful a  light  as  circumstances  will  permit. 

Now  it  must  be  admitted  that  the  circumstances 
in  which  a  boy  or  girl  begins  and  continues  work  in  a 
modern  factory  are  far  from  cheerful.  They  are  usu- 
ally very  depressing,  physically  and  mentally.  A  mo- 
notonous repetition  of  a  series  of  motions  continued 
hour  after  hour  and  day  after  day  and  year  after  year, 
in  dingy  and  noisy  surroundings,  would  seem  on  the 
surface  to  be  all  that  there  is  of  it.  As  Wyckoff  has 
so  truly  said,  the  workmen  carry  on  each  his  particular 
process  without  in  the  least  knowing  what  it  really 


mSTORY  FOR  THE  COMMON  MAN  141 

means;  consequently,  they  can  have  "no  personal 
pride  in  its  progress,  and  no  community  of  interest 
with  their  employer.  There  is  none  of  the  joy  of 
responsibility,  none  of  the  sense  of  achievement,  only 
the  dull  monotony  of  grinding  toil,  with  the  longing 
for  the  signal  to  quit  work,  and  for  their  wages  at  the 
end."  If  this  be  true,  how  can  the  workers  be  ex- 
pected to  have  the  least  appreciation  of  the  social  and 
industrial  value  of  their  labor?  How  can  they  be 
expected  to  take  an  intelligent  view  of  their  responsi- 
bilities, or  conceive  rational  plans  for  bettering  their 
condition  ?  This  is  the  general  situation  which  those 
who  organize  industrial  schools  must  face,  fairly  and 
squarely. 

In  their  endeavors  to  offset  the  existing  evils,  I  am 
convinced  that  they  will  be  forced  to  summon  history 
to  their  aid  —  not  the  history  now  to  be  found  in  our 
textbooks,  but  those  phases  of  past  human  experience 
and  achievement  which  serve  to  explain  our  indus- 
trial life  and  make  its  import  clear.  History  alone  can 
explain  the  existence  of  the  machine  which  the  opera- 
tive must  tend.  It  is  the  very  last  link  in  a  chain  of 
marvelous  discoveries  reaching  back  hundreds  of 
thousands  of  years  to  the  bits  of  flint  which  were  among 
man's  earliest  implements  and  which  may  have  started 
him  on  his  long  career  of  mechanical  invention  and 
social  development.  The  operative  will  learn  from 
history  how  the  present  division  of  labor,  of  which  he 
seems  to  be  the  helpless  victim,  has  come  about;  he 


142  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

will  perceive  its  vast  social  significance  and  will  com- 
prehend the  rather  hard  terms  on  which  things  get 
made  rapidly,  cheaply,  and  in  great  quantities.  An 
understanding  of  this  may  suggest  ways  in  which  as 
he  grows  older,  he  can  become  influential  in  bettering 
the  lot  of  himself  and  his  fellows  without  seriously 
diminishing  the  output,  and  conciliate  economic  effi- 
ciency with  the  welfare  of  the  workmen,  —  which  is, 
after  all,  as  important  a  problem  as  exists  in  industrial 
Ufe. 

For  example,  it  seems  to  an  outsider  as  stupid  as  it 
is  disastrous  that,  with  the  simplification  of  processes 
through  the  division  of  labor,  there  has  not  been  a 
countervailing  tendency  to  enable  the  workman  to 
carry  on  in  succession  a  series  of  contributions  to  the 
completed  product.  The  grinding  monotony  might 
be  relieved,  from  time  to  time,  by  a  reasonable  alter- 
nation of  duties  so  as  to  bring  into  play  a  new  set  of 
muscles  and  of  mental  adjustments.  There  are, 
assuredly,  a  considerable  number  of  disadvantages  in 
prevailing  practices  which  a  more  intelhgent,  sym- 
pathetic, and  alert  set  of  workmen  could  cooperate  in 
abolishing  or  alleviating  without  serious  economic 
sacrifice. 

Besides  giving  the  artisan  an  idea  of  social  progress 
and  its  possibilities,  history  will  furnish  him  a  back- 
ground of  incidental  information  which  he  can  utilize 
in  his  daily  surroundings,  and  which  will  arouse  and 
foster  his  imagination  by  carrying  him,  in  thought, 


HISTORY  FOR  THE  COMMON  MAN  143 

far  beyond  the  narrow  confines  of  his  factory.  It  is 
impossible  to  do  more  than  enumerate  a  few  of  the 
most  conspicuous  and  impressive  facts  in  man's  devel- 
opment, which  would  arouse  the  attention  of  the  boys 
and  girls,  and  might,  as  the  years  went  on,  give  them 
an  outlook  on  life  that  they  would  get  in  no  other 
way.  We  might  begin  with  the  well-known  fact  that 
man  is  by  no  means  the  only  artisan  in  our  world. 
Without  his  tools,  he  would  be  unable  to  compete  with 
the  spider,  the  bee,  or  the  wasp.  Certain  birds  con- 
struct very  elaborate  dwellings  for  themselves  and 
their  families,  but  man's  ancestors,  to  judge  from  his 
nearest  relatives  which  exist  to-day,  could  do  no  more 
than  make  a  rude  platform  of  boughs.  When  our  dis- 
tant forebears  began  to  walk  firmly  on  their  hind  legs 
and  thus  found  their  hands  free,  then  it  was  that  their 
good,  big  brains  began  to  undergo  those  changes  that 
make  them  so  superior  to  those  of  the  highest  apes. 
In  this  long  process  we  may  assume  that  two  factors 
have  been  specially  potent  in  developing  the  peculiarly 
human  heritage  of  culture,  as  distinguished  from  the 
instinctive  and  often  marvelous  skill  of  other  animals : 
these  are  language  and  the  invention  of  tools. 

In  the  beginning,  man  was  a  far  more  clumsy  and 
ineflfident  artisan  than  the  wasp ;  but  he  had  the  great 
advantage,  if  he  happened  to  be  particularly  clever, 
of  being  able,  not  only  to  do  something  from  time  to 
time  that  his  ancestors  had  never  done,  but  to  trans- 
mit this  improvement  to  succeeding  generations.   How 


144  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

the  wasp  developed  its  skill  we  do  not  know ;  but,  as 
it  now  is,  so  it  remains  —  it  neither  increases  nor  de- 
clines, as  does  human  culture,  for  the  simple  reason 
that  it  does  not  have  to  be  taught  to  each  generation 
by  the  last.  Could  we  imagine  a  child  to-day  grow- 
ing up  absolutely  untaught  and  unaffected  by  the 
example  of  those  around  him,  he  would,  in  all  probabil- 
ity, be  little  superior  in  point  of  civilization  to  a  ba- 
boon. In  short,  our  achievements  are  not  innate,  — 
we  owe  practically  all  of  them  to  past  generations. 
The  accumulation  of  culture  and  its  transmission  by 
education  in  the  widest  sense  of  the  word  is  the 
chief  distinction  and  duty  of  our  species.  A  great 
part  of  our  development,  and  a  great  part  of  the 
heritage  that  has  been  transmitted  to  us  from  age 
to  age,  is  associated  with  our  implements.  By  his 
tools  man  can  be  traced  back  through  hundreds  of 
thousands  of  years.  Indeed,  only  the  stones  and  bits 
of  flint  that  he  modified  to  his  uses  survive  from  the 
very  remote  periods.  The  French  anthropologists 
have  established  a  succession  of  eras  in  the  history 
of  the  old  stone  men,  based  on  the  variety  and  finish 
of  their  implements.  The  history  of  man,  then, 
begins  with  his  industries;  and  I  am  not  sure  that 
his  industries,  in  a  broad  sense  of  the  term,  have  not 
always  constituted  as  good  a  single  test  of  his  general 
civilization  and  as  satisfactory  a  clue  to  its  vicissi- 
tudes as  can  be  found. 
After  the  last  advance  of  the  ice  sheet  in  Europe, 


HISTORY  FOR  THE  COMMON  MAN  145 

and  perhaps  not  more  than  seven  to  ten  thousand  years 
ago,  the  so-called  "neolithic"  phase  of  civilization 
clearly  emerges,  with  its  ground  stone  implements, 
its  pottery,  agriculture,  and  domestic  animals.  This 
stage,  before  the  gradual  introduction  of  metals, 
seems  to  have  prevailed  very  generally  in  both  the  old 
world  and  the  new.  It  lies  back  of  the  civilization 
of  Egypt  and  Babylonia;  it  was  the  condition  in 
which  the  Europeans  found  the  peoples  of  America, 
four  centuries  ago ;  and  it  may  still  be  studied  in 
various  parts  of  the  earth  where  it  continues  to  exist. 
There  should  be  no  difficulty  in  explaining  vividly 
to  a  child  this  intermediate  grade  of  civilization,  —  so 
complicated  from  the  standpoint  of  the  chimpanzee, 
so  simple  from  the  standpoint  of  that  of  Greece  or 
Rome. 

The  recent  discoveries  in  Egypt  indicate  that  some 
four  thousand  years  before  Christ  a  marked  advance 
beyond  the  neolithic  age  had  already  taken  place 
there.  A  rapid  and  graceful  system  of  writing  had 
been  developed,  copper  was  beginning  to  be  used  for 
vessels,  and,  when  properly  hardened,  it  became  avail- 
able for  tools.  The  ancient  Egyptian  seems  to  have 
been  an  ever  industrious  and  practical  person,  to 
whom  business  made  a  strong  appeal.  The  book- 
keeper is  a  conspicuous  figure  in  the  paintings  which 
have  come  down  to  us.  The  Egyptian's  art  was 
closely  associated  with  his  peculiar  environment  and 
his  industries.     As  Breasted  has  well  said:    "The 

L 


146  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

lotus  blossomed  on  the  handle  of  his  spoon,  and  his 
wine  sparkled  in  the  deep  blue  calix  of  the  same 
flower ;  the  muscular  limb  of  the  ox  in  carved  ivory 
upheld  the  couch  on  which  he  slept ;  the  ceiling  over- 
head was  a  starry  heaven  resting  on  palm  trunk 
columns,  each  crowned  with  its  graceful  tuft  of  droop- 
ing foliage." 

The  range  of  Greek  manufactures  might  also  easily 
be  brought  into  instructive  relation  with  both  their 
art  and  their  conceptions  of  life,  in  such  a  way  as  to 
give  a  far  more  adequate  notion  of  this  extraordinary 
people  than  one  is  likely  to  derive  from  the  textbooks 
that  tell  of  their  political  assemblies  and  constant 
wars.  We  still  have  many  examples  of  their  lovely 
vases  and  cups  and  platters,  their  bracelets,  earrings, 
and  mirrors.  We  can  form  an  excellent  idea  of  their 
furniture  as  well  as  of  their  temples  and  theaters. 

While  the  Greeks  prized  beautiful  things  as  no  other 
people  before  them,  so  far  as  we  know,  manual  labor 
was  viewed  with  contempt  by  the  leisure  class.  This 
could  not  be  otherwise  at  a  time  when  almost  all  in- 
dustrial operations  were  carried  on  by  slaves,  a  class 
constantly  recruited  by  captives,  and  sufficiently 
large  to  manufacture  all  the  necessary  commodities. 
Aristotle,  in  a  famous  chapter  of  his  Politics,  de- 
clares slavery  to  be  in  accordance  with  nature,  since 
there  is  always  a  considerable  class  of  persons  fit 
for  nothing  else;  although  he  admits  that  many 
become  slaves  through  ill  fortune  who  ought  properly 


mSTORY  FOR  THE  COMMON  MAN  147 

to  be  free,  and  that  many  others  are  free  who  have 
all  the  natural  traits  of  slaves.  The  higher  branches 
of  science  did  not  aim  at  usefulness,  and  owed  their 
dignity  to  that  fact.  They  could  only  be  carried  on 
by  those  who  did  not  use  their  hands  and  who  de- 
voted themselves  to  a  leisurely,  contemplative  life. 
Seneca  repudiates  with  warmth  the  idea  that  the 
practical  arts  were  "invented  by  men  of  exceptional 
genius.  He  declares  that,  on  the  contrary,  they  are 
vulgar  devices  of  the  lowest  of  humanity,  and  should 
be  left  to  slaves.  Moreover,  Aristotle,  in  his  Meta- 
physics, speaks  as  if  all  possible  practical  inventions 
had  long  ago  been  made.  So  the  philosophers  and 
the  institution  of  slavery  combined  in  ancient  Greece 
to  discredit  industry.  Thus  it  came  about  that  the 
use  of  one's  hands  and  head  in  the  making  of  useful 
articles  was  condemned  as  degrading;  and  the  more 
completely  one  could  free  himself  from  such  useful 
employment,  the  more  prospect  he  had  of  rising  to 
the  full  dignity  of  a  man  and  a  philosopher. 

The  Romans  took  over  the  Greek  industries  that 
suited  their  purposes,  and  these  were  transmitted  to 
medieval  Europe,  with  such  modifications  as  change 
of  taste  and  alterations  in  the  general  habits  of  life 
called  for.  The  growth  of  the  towns  in  the  twelfth 
century  was  accompanied  by  interesting  developments 
of  craft  guilds,  and  the  master  workmen  in  the  various 
trades  began  to  play  a  far  more  important  and  digni- 
fied r61e  in  public  afifairs  than  ever  before.    More- 


148  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

over,  the  common  artisan  ceased  to  be  a  slave,  or 
even  a  serf,  so  that  one  of  the  gravest  disadvantages 
attaching  to  manual  labor  in  Greece  and  Rome  dis- 
appeared in  western  Europe  five  or  six  centuries  ago. 
The  beginning  of  this  rehabilitation  of  industry  is, 
perhaps,  reflected  in  the  prevalence  of  surnames 
derived  from  homely  occupations.  The  time  came 
when  no  one  was  ashamed  to  be  called  Taylor,  Turner, 
Weaver,  Smith,  Fuller,  Cooper,  Brewster,  Hooper, 
Chandler,  Fletcher,  Potter,  Horner,  or  Currier. 

From  the  thirteenth  century  on,  there  began  to  be 
premonitions  that  industry  might  sometime  be  revolu- 
tionized by  new  discoveries.  A  method  of  melting 
iron  was  discovered,  for  instance,  so  that  it  could  be 
cast,  instead  of  forged,  after  merely  softening,  as  pre- 
viously. The  alchemist,  in  his  search  for  an  elixir 
which  would  turn  copper  into  gold,  and  lead  into 
silver,  and  prolong  life  indefinitely,  came  upon  hitherto 
unsuspected  properties  in  the  substances  he  experi- 
mented with,  and  so  laid  the  foundations  for  what 
was  to  become  applied  chemistry.  Yet  no  very  strik- 
ing changes  in  industry  occurred  before  the  eighteenth 
century.  In  the  days  of  Louis  XIV,  when  inventors 
were  already  becoming  rather  common,  the  people 
of  western  Europe  still  continued  to  spin  and  weave 
with  very  simple  devices.  Merchandise  was  still 
carried  about  on  slow  carts,  and  letters  were  as  long 
in.  getting  from  London  to  Rome  as  in  the  time  of 
Constantine. 


HISTORY  FOR  THE   COMMON  MAN  14^ 

But  two  great  truths  were  gradually  dawning  on 
the  more  thoughtful.  One  was  the  importance  of  the 
seemingly  homely,  common,  and  inconspicuous  things 
about  them ;  the  other  was  the  possibility  of  making 
use  of  our  knowledge  of  common  things  to  promote 
the  general  welfare.  Neither  the  ancient  nor  the 
medieval  thinkers  had  paid  much  attention  to  the 
material  world.  They  withdrew  themselves  from 
nature,  and,  as  Lord  Bacon  said,  they  "tumbled  up 
and  down  in  their  own  reason  and  conceits,"  and 
sought  the  truth  in  their  own  little  heads  and  not  in 
the  great  common  world  about  them.  When  men  of 
first-rate  ability  turned  from  a  consideration  of  the 
good,  the  true,  and  the  beautiful,  and  of  the  precise 
relation  of  the  three  members  of  the  Trinity  to  one 
another,  and  began  to  wonder  what  makes  milk  sour 
quicker  in  hot  weather  than  in  cool,  and  why  an 
object  seen  through  a  glass  bottle  is  magnified,  they 
had  already  made  the  transitions  from  the  old  to  the 
new  attitude  of  mind. 

Patient  observation,  experimentation,  and  calcula- 
tion, in  the  spirit  of  modem  research,  did  not  begin 
to  be  carried  on  in  Europe,  on  a  large  scale,  before 
the  opening  of  the  seventeenth  century;  and  since 
that  time  the  progress  in  accumulating  knowledge 
and  applying  it  to  the  relief  of  man's  estate  has  been 
absolutely  without  precedent  in  the  history  of  the 
globe.  The  story  of  modern  invention  and  of  its 
revolutionary  efifects  on  our  life  and  our  ideals  of 


150  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

progress  cannot  be  even  sketched  out  here.  But  it 
is  infinitely  more  absorbing  and  vital  than  the  record 
of  kings,  conquests,  and  treaties,  and  of  the  delibera- 
tions and  decrees  of  public  assemblies,  which  have  so 
long  been  regarded  as  constituting  orthodox  history. 
Moreover,  what  child  could  fail  to  follow  eagerly, 
if  the  matter  were  but  clearly  put  to  him,  the  marvel- 
ous doings  of  the  steam  engine,  which  has  shown  itself 
far  more  potent  to  alter  man's  ways  than  all  the  edicts 
of  all  the  kings  and  parliaments  that  have  ever 
existed.  In  1704,  an  EngUshman,  Newcomen,  devised 
an  awkward  form  of  steam  engine,  which  would  work 
a  pump  —  a  lumbering,  slow,  inefficient,  impromising 
contrivance,  which  was  destined,  nevertheless,  to 
grow  into  the  most  rapidly  revolutionizing  force  in 
the  history  of  the  world.  The  pump  enabled  the 
miners  to  keep  under  control  the  water  that  would 
otherwise  have  impeded  them  in  extracting  both  coal 
and  iron.  By  the  use  of  the  iron,  new  machines 
could  be  made,  and  with  the  coal,  they  could  be  run. 
So,  with  iron  and  coal  and  steam  both  old  and  new 
kinds  of  products  could  be  turned  out  in  unprece- 
dented quantities;  and  with  iron,  coal,  and  steam 
they  could  be  dispatched  to  all  parts  of  the  earth. 
Factories  equipped  with  the  new  machinery  grew  up, 
and  cities  centered  around  the  factories.  So  it  has 
come  about  that  the  tool  has  again  come  into  its  own 
as  the  agent  and  symbol  of  man's  progress,  and  that 
the  past  one  hundred  and  fifty  years  have  seen  vastly 


HISTORY  FOR  THE  COMMON  MAN  151 

greater  changes  than  the  whole  five  thousand  years 
that  elapsed  between  the  reign  of  King  Menes  I  of 
Egypt  and  that  of  George  III  of  England.  Just  as 
the  use  of  a  stick  and  a  piece  of  flint  began  the  in- 
tellectual development  which  slowly  raised  man  above 
the  ape  in  his  habits  of  life,  so  a  new  method  of 
operating  his  tools  —  the  steam  engine  —  ushered  in 
an  expansion  of  his  activities,  interests,  and  social 
and  moral  problems,  the  end  of  which  is  not  yet. 

As  we  are  all  keenly  and  sadly  aware,  the  Industrial 
Revolution,  while  greatly  adding  to  our  comforts  and 
to  the  range  of  our  experiences  by  bringing  the  whole 
world  together  and  rendering  it  in  a  certain  sense 
accessible  to  all  of  us  through  easy  and  rapid  inter- 
communication, has  left  the  mass  of  workers  whose 
lives  are  passed  in  factories  in  almost  a  worse  plight 
than  that  of  the  Greek  and  Roman  slaves.  It  was 
evidently  too  much  to  e^ect  of  our  western  world 
that  it  should  effect  such  an  absolutely  unprecedented 
metamorphosis  of  the  material  conditions  of  life,  and 
at  the  same  time  guard  against  all  the  evils  to  which 
the  tremendous  changes  involved  might  give  rise. 
Long  hours  of  monotonous  mechanical  work  in  tend- 
ing a  tireless  machine  or  in  repeating  some  minute 
operation  in  the  highly  eflScient  but  often  inhuman 
division  of  labor  on  which  our  modern  industrial  sys- 
tem rests,  together  with  insufficient  and  precarious 
wages  and  demoralizing  concomitant  conditions,  form 
at  present  the  debit  side  of  the  balance  sheet. 


152  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

As  an  offset,  promising  speedy  betterment,  we  have 
a  growing  sense  of  social  justice,  a  higher  appreciation 
of  economic  and  social  expediency,  and  an  enthusiasm 
for  democratic  education.  The  unthinking  charity 
of  the  Middle  Ages  has  become  the  organized  social 
work  of  to-day,  which  is  begotten  and  fostered  by  a 
union  of  human  sympathy  and  exacting  scientific 
research.  If  the  machine  has  produced  a  new  form 
of  slavery,  it  has  also  produced  its  antidote.  It 
holds  out  the  possibility  of  abolishing  poverty  alto- 
gether, in  the  sense  of  suffering  from  hunger,  cold, 
and  nakedness.  For  there  is  now  energy  enough  at 
man's  disposal,  in  steam  and  electricity,  to  supply 
him  with  the  necessities  of  life  in  such  abundance  that, 
if  properly  distributed,  no  one  need  be  in  physical 
want.  What  is  still  more  fundamental,  with  the 
Industrial  Revolution  has  come  a  respect,  not  to 
say  veneration,  for  labor,  which  Aristotle  would  hardly 
have  comprehended.  Instead  of  dreaming  of  a  per- 
fect existence,  free  from  all  participation  in  the  task 
of  supplying  our  material  needs,  Tolstoi  and  many 
others  see  the  ideal  life  in  a  happy  combination  of 
useful  manual  labor  and  leisure.  The  effect  on  body, 
mind,  and  temper  of  productive  manual  work,  carried 
on  intelligently,  under  suitable  conditions,  and  for 
periods  adjusted  to  the  strength  of  the  worker  and 
to  his  other  duties  in  hfe,  would  unquestionably  be 
most  salutary.  And  while  we  have  not  yet  arrived 
at  this  happy  adjustment,  except  in  rare  cases,  we 


HISTORY  FOR  THE  COMMON  MAN  153 

at  least  no  longer  scorn  manual  labor  as  such,  nor 
do  we  deem  it  inherently  degrading. 

Let  us  return  now  to  the  question  of  the  relation 
of  aU  this  to  industrial  education,  which  is  in  itself 
but  the  latest  product  of  the  long  historic  process 
which  we  have  been  tracing.  To  me  it  seems  obvious 
that  just  the  sort  of  facts  that  we  have  been  reviewing 
are  precisely  those  which  we  should  be  particularly 
anxious  that  the  boys  and  girls  in  the  industrial 
school  should  be  aware  of  and  should  lay  to  heart,  in 
order  to  gain  that  attitude  of  mind  which  not  only 
would  make  them  the  best  kind  of  artisans,  but 
would  give  them  an  intelligent  appreciation  of  their 
work  and  enable  them  to  cooperate  in  the  process 
of  eliminating  the  evils  from  which  they  suffer.  And 
how  can  these  facts  be  so  easily,  so  permanently, 
and  so  naturally  impressed  on  the  pupil's  mind  as  by 
the  kind  of  historical  study  which  has  been  outlined 
in  this  brief  summary  of  the  long  story  of  manual 
labor?  Such  study  will  not  only  meet  the  special 
needs  of  those  whose  education  we  are  discussing, 
but  it  will  furnish  at  the  same  time  the  best,  perhaps 
the  only,  means  of  cultivating  that  breadth  of  view, 
moral  and  intellectual  perspective,  and  enthusiasm 
for  progress  which  must  always  come  with  a  percej>- 
tion  of  the  relation  of  the  present  to  the  past. 


"THE  FALL  OF  ROME" 


A  HISTORICAL  writer  is  always  puzzled  as  to  where 
to  begin  and  end  his  story.  For  his  own  conven- 
ience and  that  of  the  reader  he  is  accustomed  to  di- 
vide the  past  into  epochs  or  periods.  Having  selected 
a  terminus  a  quo  and  a  terminus  ad  qu^m,  as  the  Scho- 
lastics were  wont  to  say,  he  proceeds  to  justify  his 
boundaries  as  best  he  may.  He  knows  well  enough, 
particularly  if  he  be  a  modern  historian,  that  his 
divisions  are  highly  artificial;  he  generally  confesses 
this,  but  then  does  the  best  he  can  to  obscure  the  fact 
in  his  endeavors  to  defend  the  divisions  he  adopts. 
This,  indeed,  is  the  regular  procedure  of  the  histo- 
rian, who  has  to  reconcile  the  inexorable  continuity  of 
man's  experiences  with  the  demands  of  clear  literary 
presentation,  and,  unhappily,  he  is  usually  all  too  skill- 
ful in  concealing  the  violence  he  does  to  historic  truth. 
The  older  historians  may  be  forgiven  on  the  ground 
that  our  conception  of  the  continuity  of  history  is 
essentially  a  modern  one  —  a  product  of  the  nine- 
teenth century.  Formerly  it  was  believed  that  heroic 
men,  decisive  conflicts,  or  the  intervention  of  God  him- 
self broke  here  and  there  somewhat  sharply  the  trend 

154 


"THE  FALL  OF  ROME"  155 

of  human  affairs.  This  view  could  be  maintained 
only  so  long  as  merely  the  conspicuous  events  of  the 
past  attracted  the  attention  of  the  historian.  So 
soon,  however,  as  he  began  to  concern  himself  with  a 
wide  range  of  human  interests,  with  the  relatively 
permanent  rather  than  with  the  episodic  and  tran- 
sient, he  perceived  that  general  changes  are  necessarily 
slow  —  very  slow. 

This,  as  has  been  pointed  out  in 'a  former  essay,  is 
due  to  two  circumstances.  The  first  is  the  intricacy  of 
all  the  higher  civilizations.  If  we  consider  the  whole 
range  of  man's  interests  in  the  fifth  or  the  tenth 
or  the  eighteenth  century,  we  see  that  no  single  man 
or  battle  or  treaty  could  possibly  alter  at  once  the 
prevailing  religious,  intellectual,  artistic,  scientific, 
linguistic,  industrial,  mercantile,  legal,  military,  and 
political  ideas  and  habits.  A  battle  or  treaty  may 
change  a  people's  ruler,  a  great  pestilence  may  affect 
their  economic  situation,  but  there  is  no  instance  of 
any  single  circumstance  producing  an  abrupt  change 
in  more  than  a  small  portion  of  human  habits,  cus- 
toms, and  institutions. 

The  second  fundamental  element  in  the  continuity 
of  history  is  inertia  and  lack  of  imagination.  These 
two  mental  characteristics  explain  why  even  where 
there  has  been  an  abrupt  change  in  a  single  field  of 
interest  a  great  part  of  the  old  has  still  been  carried 
over  into  the  new.  A  well-known  example  of  this  is 
the  perpetuation  after  the  French  Revolution  of  many 


156  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

of  those  governmental  pecuKarities  which  were  char- 
acteristic of  France  in  the  eighteenth  century. 

In  view  of  these  facts  we  can  but  look  with  the 
utmost  suspicion  on  all  the  traditional  "periods" 
which  are  generally  accepted  in  historical  literature; 
because  they  appealed  to  our  predecessors  there  is 
not  the  least  reason  for  supposing  that  they  can  be 
defended  now. 

Most  of  us  were  doubtless  reared  upon  the  idea  that 
after  the  Fall  of  Rome  the  Middle  Ages  set  in,  and 
that  then,  after  a  long  period  of  darkness,  humanity 
was  awakened  from  its  winter  sleep  by  the  recovery 
of  the  long-lost  writings  of  the  Greeks  and  Romans. 
This  escape  from  the  Middle  Ages,  which  is  known  as 
the  Renaissance,  prepared  the  way  —  such,  at  least,  is 
the  popular  view  of  Protestants  —  for  a  great  spiritual 
awakening  which  unmistakably  ushered  in  modern 
times.  The  next  crisis  to  attract  general  attention  is 
the  French  Revolution.  Our  textbooks  and  our  col- 
lege courses  still  adjust  themselves  to  this  series  of 
epochs. 

Of  course,  every  serious-minded  historical  student 
sees  clearly  the  deficiencies  of  these  divisions;  he 
knows  very  well  the  difficulties  of  establishing  the 
points  at  which  the  Middle  Ages  began  and  left  off. 
It  is  especially  difficult  to  tell  where  to  place  the  be- 
ginning of  modern  times  ;  and  as  for  the  "  Revolution," 
we  still  seem  to  be  in  the  midst  of  that.  Historians 
do  not,  however,  always  perceive  the  positively  mis- 


"THE  FALL  OF  ROME"  157 

chievous  results  of  classifying  our  notions  of  the  past 
under  these  headings.  The  "periods"  sp>oken  of 
above  are  not  merely  subject  to  criticism,  they  per- 
petuate a  wholly  wrong  perspective  of  the  past. 

It  is  becoming  clear  to  the  modem  historical  student 
that  in  the  whole  history  of  western  Europe  there  is 
perhaps  no  sharper  break  than  that  which  separates 
the  earlier  from  the  later  Middle  Ages.  In  the 
twelfth  century  there  was  an  awakening  of  intellectual 
interest  which  created  the  universities,  the  revival  of 
the  Roman  law,  the  codification  of  the  canon  law, 
the  systematizing  of  the  patristic  theology;  then, 
too,  came  the  growth  of  urban  life,  the  extension  of 
commerce,  the  blossoming  of  Gothic  architecture,  and 
the  development  of  literatures  of  great  beauty  in  the 
vernacular  languages. 

By  the  opening  of  the  thirteenth  century  the  atten- 
tion of  intellectual  Europe  was  becoming  centered  on 
the  greatest  of  the  ancient  philosophers,  and  his  works 
were  once  more  spread  out  before  the  eager  eyes  of 
western  students.  The  so-called  Renaissance  offers 
nothing  comparable  to  the  achievements  of  the  twelfth 
and  thirteenth  centuries.  It  is  true  that  in  the  four- 
teenth and  fifteenth  centuries  the  Italian  towns 
developed  an  interesting  civilization  and  a  marvelous 
art  different  from  that  which  went  before.  These 
have  perhaps  blinded  us  to  the  relatively  slight 
contributions  of  the  period  to  general  change.  To 
one  who  is  intent  upon  establishing  the  continuity  of 


158  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

history  the  men  of  letters,  the  philosophers,  and  even 
the  artists  of  the  Renaissance,  exhibit  an  extraor- 
dinary intellectual  conservatism.  They  transcended 
relatively  few  of  the  ancient  superstitions,  contributed 
but  little  to  the  knowledge  of  the  world,  and  readily 
yielded  to  the  fascination  of  Neoplatonic  mysticism, 
as  is  illustrated  by  Ficino,  Pico,  and  ReuchUn. 

As  has  been  said  elsewhere,^  it  was  quite  possible 
to  read  the  classics  without  becoming  forthwith 
Hellenic  in  one's  attitude  of  mind.  It  may  be  safely 
said  that  as  one's  acquaintance  with  the  Middle  Ages, 
as  well  as  his  appreciation  of  our  own  time,  increases, 
the  Renaissance  seems  to  grow  more  and  more 
shadowy  as  a  distinctive  period ;  and  yet  many  writers 
use  the  term  as  if  the  Renaissance  were  a  bright 
spirit,  hovering  over  Europe,  touching  this  writer  and 
that  painter  or  architect,  and  passing  by  others  who 
were  in  consequence  left  in  medieval  darkness. 

To  those  seeking  to  fix  a  date  for  the  beginning  of 
modern  times,  three  events  have  suggested  them- 
selves as  plausible  points  of  departure:  the  fall  of 
Constantinople  into  the  hands  of  the  Turks  in  1453, 
the  discovery  of  America  in  1492,  and  the  posting 
of  Luther's  theses  in  151 7.  But  none  of  these  events 
appear  to  possess  the  importance  commonly  assigned 
to  them.  The  assumption  that  the  fall  of  Constanti- 
nople forced  Greek  scholars  to  earn  an  honest  liveli- 
hood by  inculcating  the  rudiments  of  their  classical 
^  See  above,  pp.  116  sqq. 


"THE  FALL  OF  ROME"  I59 

tongue  among  those  western  peoples  who  availed 
themselves  of  their  services,  and  that  in  this  way  the 
knowledge  of  the  ancient  learning  was  once  more  re- 
vived, with  all  its  accompanying  enUghtenment,  will 
of  course  not  bear  careful  scrutiny.  The  revival  of 
Greek  learning  had  been  going  on  in  Italy  for  fifty 
years  before  the  Turks  took  Constantinople.  Aurispa 
and  Filelfo  had  brought  over  large  quantities  of  Greek 
manuscripts,  and  the  Italian  humanists  were  already 
busy  translating  them.  It  is  true  that  certain  Greek 
scholars  settled  in  the  West  after  the  fall  of  Constanti- 
nople, but  there  is  no  indication  that  the  trend  of 
humanism  was  perceptibly  affected  by  them ;  so  that 
the  importance  of  this  event,  from  an  intellectual  and 
literary  standpoint,  is  probably  neghgible. 

As  for  the  discovery  of  America,  it  should  be  re- 
membered that  America  was  not  discovered  in  the 
proper  sense  of  the  word  in  1492  ;  for  Columbus  died 
beUeving  that  he  had  merely  reached  India  by  a  water 
route.  Even  as  late  as  16 10  Henry  Hudson  had  hopes 
of  reaching  the  Pacific  by  sailing  up  the  Hudson.  It 
may  seem  to  us  now  as  if  the  discovery  of  a  new  hemi- 
sphere must  have  produced  a  decisive  widening  of 
outlook,  but  the  significance  of  the  discovery  dawned 
so  slowly  on  the  European  mind  that  the  effect  was 
scarcely  perceptible  for  decades. 

It  is  hardly  necessary  to  consider  the  old  assumption 
that  Luther's  scholastic  disputation  in  regard  to  the 
meaning  and  implications  of  poenitentia  opened  a  new 


l6o  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

epoch  in  the  world's  history.  It  is  true  that  within 
fifteen  or  twenty  years  a  certain  number  of  northern 
European  states  had  seceded  from  the  Holy  Roman 
Apostolic  Church  and  had  definitely  rejected  the  head- 
ship of  the  pope.  While  the  posting  of  the  theses  was 
not  a  wholly  negligible  factor  in  the  situation,  it  cer- 
tainly had  no  direct  bearing  on  a£fairs  in  Switzerland, 
England,  or  France. 

n 

Among  the  historical  breaks  that  have  been  made 
familiar  to  us  by  our  textbooks  and  standard  histories 
none  is  more  impressive  than  the  "  Fall  of  Rome." 
Here,  if  anywhere,  one  might  be  excused  for  expecting 
the  opening  of  a  new  era.  The  German  barbarians 
overwhelm  the  Empire,  and  the  long  line  of  imperial 
rulers  beginning  with  Augustus  is  extinguished  in 
Italy  in  the  fatal  year  476.  It  has  been  assumed  that 
the  dissolution  of  the  Empire  in  the  West  was  the 
beginning  of  a  series  of  vital  changes  in  Europe,  — 
yet  this  assumption,  natural  as  it  is,  is  to  a  great 
extent  a  mistaken  one.  The  invasions  of  the  Ger- 
mans doubtless  produced  in  the  long  run  important 
results,  but  these  came  about  very  gradually.  In 
one  sense  there  was  really  little  novel  in  the  early 
Middle  Ages.  Much  was  lost,  but  little  was  found. 
A  great  part  of  those  things  that  we  think  of  as  char- 
acteristically medieval,  —  monks  and  saints  and  mir- 


"THE  FALL  OF  ROME"  l6l 

acles;  allegory  and  symbolism;  the  seven  liberal 
arts ;  the  Roman  Catholic  Church  with  its  privileges 
and  its  peculiar  relations  to  the  civil  government, — 
these  were  all  well  developed  before  Alaric  took 
Rome  in  410.  The  "Fall  of  Rome,"  therefore,  is,  at 
best,  a  specious  division  which  upon  closer  examina- 
tion ceases  to  have  those  impressive  and  decisive 
qualities  which  have  so  long  been  ascribed  to  it. 
The  elements  of  continuity  are  more  striking  than 
the  changes.  The  following  somewhat  careful  re- 
consideration of  what  was  happening  in  the  fifth 
century  will  serve  to  illustrate  the  dangers  we  run 
in  taking  the  traditional  historical  divisions  seriously. 

The  Roman  Empire  was  still  intact  when  Theo- 
dosius  the  Great  died  in  395.  It  was  governed  by  a 
vast  and  elaborate  bureaucracy  of  which  we  have  an 
impressive  picture  in  the  oflScial  list  of  offices,  which 
has  come  down  to  us,  the  so-called  Notitia  Dignitatum. 
A  century  later  the  western  portion  of  the  Empire  was 
in  a  state  of  disintegration.  We  find  kings  of  the 
Franks,  Alemanni,  Burgundians,  West  Goths,  East 
Goths,  and  Vandals,  each  ruling  over  a  more  or  less 
well-defined  portion  of  the  ancient  Roman  Empire. 

It  is  no  longer  possible  to  trace  the  process  of  dis- 
solution in  detail ;  indeed,  the  changes  were  so  compli- 
cated, so  varied,  and  so  gradual  that  even  if  we  were 
as  well  informed  about  the  fifth  century  as  we  are  in 
regard  to  the  nineteenth,  it  would  probably  be  impos- 
sible to  give  a  dear  account  of  the  revolution,  simply 


l62  THE  NEW  mSTORY 

because  it  was  inherently  irregular  and  obscure.  In 
spite,  however,  of  our  ignorance  respecting  even  the 
most  conspicuous  and  startling  external  and  public 
events,  and  in  spite  of  the  essential  vagueness  of  the 
situation,  writers  Uke  Gibbon  and  Hodgkin  have  ven- 
tured to  give  us  very  precise  and  plausible  details 
about  many  of  the  men  and  events.  They,  and  other 
writers,  have  also  hazarded  many  explanations  for  the 
so-called  "fall"  of  the  Empire.  A  friend  of  mine 
recently  amused  himself  by  making  a  collection  of  the 
reasons  assigned  in  our  historical  manuals  for  the  dis- 
aster, and  found  no  less  than  fifty.  And  all  of  them  are 
mere  guesses.  Even  those  most  commonly  accepted, 
such  as  the  declining  population  of  the  Empire  and  the 
strength  and  vigor  of  the  Germans,  have  been  alleged 
by  Fustel  de  Coulanges  to  be  quite  baseless. 

The  aims  of  this  essay  are,  first,  to  review  very 
briefly  the  general  character  of  the  sources  of  informa- 
tion for  the  fifth  century  (all  of  which,  such  as  they  are, 
are  readily  available  in  our  best  American  libraries) ; 
then  to  illustrate  in  a  general  way  the  external  process 
of  the  disruption  as  it  appears  in  the  writers  of  the 
time.  I  shall  speak  especially  of  the  alleged  division 
of  the  Empire  between  the  sons  of  Theodosius  in  395, 
of  the  events  preceding  the  capture  of  Rome  by  Alaric 
in  410,  and  lastly,  of  exactly  what  appears  to  have 
taken  place  upon  the  supposed  "fall  of  the  Western 
Empire"  in  the  year  476. 


"THE  FALL  OF  ROME"  163 

ni 

First,  then,  as  to  the  sources,  by  far  the  most 
authentic  are,  of  course,  the  laws  and  governmental 
orders  which  are  preserved  in  the  Theodosian  Code 
and  its  supplements,  the  so-called  Novellcs,  and  in  the 
Justinian  Code.  No  inconsiderable  part  of  these 
edicts  were  issued  in  the  fifth  century,  and  they 
help  to  illustrate  the  organization  of  the  Empire 
and  the  abuses  which  had  developed  in  it ;  they  often 
give  the  names  of  officials,  and  sometimes  even 
mention  events.  Unfortunately  they  are  drafted  in 
a  pompous,  oratorical  style,  and  only  become  intel- 
ligible after  some  Uttle  study. 

We  have  no  competent  contemporaneous  writer  for 
the  fifth  century  such  as  we  have  in  that  worthy  re- 
tired soldier,  Ammianus  Marcellinus,  who  fought 
under  the  emperor  Julian,  and  whose  admirable 
history  closes  with  the  defeat  of  Valens  at  Adrianople 
in  378.  Over  a  century  and  a  half  elapsed  after 
Ammianus  laid  down  his  pen  before  Procopius,  the 
next  capable  writer  whose  histories  have  escaped  de- 
struction, set  to  work  to  describe  the  campaigns  of 
Justinian  against  the  Goths,  Vandals,  and  Persians. 
That  there  were  histories  written  during  this  in- 
terval is  clear  enough,  but  only  those  which  dealt 
especially  with  the  church  have  come  down  to  us  in 
a  complete  form.  After  Ammianus  deserts  us  we 
have  to  depend  for  the  next  generation  upon  Zosimus. 


164  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

He  was  a  government  official  (Count)  in  the  eastern 
part  of  the  Empire  and  appears  to  have  written  in  the 
latter — possibly  the  earlier — half  of  the  fifth  century. 
The  closing  portion  of  his  work  is  lost,  and  the 
narrative  breaks  ofif  with  the  events  immediately 
preceding  Alaric's  capture  of  Rome.  He  was  bitterly 
opposed  to  the  Christians  and  ascribes  the  mis- 
fortunes of  the  time  to  the  desertion  of  the  old  gods 
who  had  so  long  protected  the  commonwealth. 

Fragments  of  other,  and  possibly  better,  Greek  his- 
torians have  been  preserved,  especially  by  Photius,  a 
scholarly  prelate  of  Constantinople  who  lived  in  the 
latter  part  of  the  ninth  century.  He  employed  the 
leisure  of  a  very  troubled  life  in  writing  out  brief 
analyses  of  the  books  in  his  library.  In  this  way,  an 
outline,  at  least,  of  some  of  the  lost  works  has  been 
saved ;  for  example,  the  history  of  Olympiodorus,  who 
treated  the  period  immediately  following  the  death  of 
Theodosius  the  Great,  and  upon  whom  Zosimus  relied. 
Another  of  the  medieval  excerpt-mongers,  the  erudite 
emperor  Constantine  Porphyrogenitus  (died  959), 
ordered  a  vast  collection  to  be  made  of  all  that  was 
deemed  best  worth  preserving  in  the  works  of  the  older 
historians.  This  material  was  classified  in  fifty-three 
books.  Of  the  little  that  is  still  extant  of  this  extraor- 
dinary undertaking,  the  two  books  containing  accounts 
of  the  chief  embassies  are  important.  For  instance, 
we  owe  to  the  emperor's  enthusiasm  for  learning  the 
preservation  of  a  fragment  from  perhaps  the  best  of 


"THE  FALL  OF  ROME"  165 

the  fifth-century  historians,  —  the  account  which 
Priscus  gives  of  his  visit  to  Attila,  the  king  of  the 
Huns.  We  also  owe  to  him  an  extract  from  Malchus, 
a  writer  of  the  succeeding  century,  telling  about  the 
embassy  which  Odovacar  sent  to  Constantinople  in 
476. 

Among  the  church  historians  there  are  several  who 
have  been  well  known  all  through  the  Middle  Ages 
and  down  to  the  present  day.  The  most  popular 
was  Orosius,  a  young  man  who,  under  the  inspiration 
of  Augustine,  prepared  a  general  history  of  the  world, 
with  a  view  of  discomfiting  the  heathen  country  peo- 
ple, pagani.  His  object  was,  he  tells  us,  to  ransack  the 
annals  of  the  past  for  horrors  and  disasters  of  every 
kind,  —  wars,  pestilence,  famine,  earthquakes,  inun- 
dations, and  noteworthy  crimes,  —  setting  them  forth 
in  an  orderly  fashion  with  a  view  to  demonstrating 
that  the  world  had  been  no  happier  when  the  pagan 
gods  were  revered  than  it  had  been  since  the  introduc- 
tion of  Christianity.  The  last  dozen  pages  of  this 
Seven  Books  of  History  against  the  Pagans  relate  to  the 
first  eighteen  years  of  the  fifth  century.  He  is  recall- 
ing events  which  he  assumes  are  known  to  everybody, 
and  his  only  object  is  to  show  that  those  prospered 
who  feared  the  Lord,  while  those  who  clung  to  the  old 
gods  met  speedy  destruction.  It  is  evident,  therefore, 
that  Orosius  can  easily  be  taken  more  seriously  than 
he  in  any  way  deserves.  The  most  reckless  and  sensa- 
tional sermon  of  a  professional  revivalist  of  the  present 


1 66  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

day  would  be  as  reliable  a  source  of  objective  truth 
as  he. 

Covering  the  first  third  of  the  fifth  century  we  have 
the  Greek  ecclesiastical  writers,  Socrates,  Sozomenus, 
and  Theodoret.  All  of  these  are  specially  interested 
in  heresies,  monks,  and  miracles,  and  give  far  less  in- 
formation than  might  be  hoped  for  in  regard  to  the 
trend  of  events.  Indeed,  very  little  can  be  had  from 
them  respecting  the  political  history  of  the  time. 

In  the  annalists  we  occasionally  find  brief  accounts  of 
events,  although  the  compilers  of  annals  were  chiefly 
interested  in  giving  a  correct  list  of  the  successive 
consuls,  and  often  skip  a  number  of  years  with- 
out inserting  a  single  occurrence.  Some  hints  may, 
however,  be  derived  from  Prosper,  who  lived  in 
the  fifth  century,  and  brought  his  annals  down  to  454 ; 
from  Count  Marcellinus,  who  probably  wrote  under 
Justinian;  and  from  the  vestiges  of  a  supposed  Ital- 
ian chronicle,  which  have  been  carefully  collected  by 
Mommsen.  It  would,  however,  be  hard  to  exaggerate 
the  vagueness  and  scrappiness  of  this  class  of  sources. 

The  lives  of  the  saints  occasionally  refer  to  contem- 
poraneous events,  although  not  very  commonly. 
Some  light  may  be  derived  from  the  life  of  Bishop 
Epiphanius  of  Pavia,  written  by  his  successor,  Enno- 
dius,  about  the  year  505,  in  which  there  are  allusions 
to  Ricimer,  Orestes,  Odovacar,  and  to  the  troubles  of 
the  times.  The  scantiness  of  material  leads  the  his- 
torical student  to  make  the  most  of  every  hint ;  even 


"THE  FALL  OF  ROME"  167 

the  poets  have  to  be  utilized,  especially  the  panegyrists. 
At  the  opening  of  the  century  there  was  Claudian, 
an  ardent  admirer  of  StiUcho,  who  sung  his  praises 
in  very  good  hexameters.  Claudian  was,  however, 
not  only  a  warm  partisan,  but  any  anxiety  that  he 
may  have  had  to  tell  the  truth  must  have  been  dis- 
couraged by  the  exigencies  of  an  exacting  prosody. 
The  assertion  that  Alaric  was  given  an  office  by  the 
Roman  government  after  his  return  from  devastat- 
ing Greece  is  derived  from  a  vague  allusion  to  the 
matter  in  two  of  Claudian's  lines. 

In  the  second  half  of  the  fifth  century  we  have 
another  well-known  writer,  ApoUinaris  Sidonius.  He 
lauds  several  emperors  in  turn,  the  first  being  his 
father-in-law,  Avitus,  His  allusions  are  not  more 
clear  or  reliable  than  Claudian's;  indeed,  they  are 
not  so  simple  and  direct.  We  have,  however,  a  con- 
siderable body  of  letters  from  the  pen  of  Sidonius, 
which  indicate  plainly  enough  that  one  might  live  in 
France  in  the  latter  part  of  the  fifth  century,  with 
Burgundians,  Gauls,  and  Franks  all  about,  and  still 
carry  on  one's  literary  pursuits  and  escape  the  sum- 
mer heats  in  a  delightful  and  perfectly  appointed 
villa.  Besides  the  letters  of  Sidonius  we  have  those 
of  a  few  other  important  men  of  the  time,  of  Leo  the 
Great,'for  instance,  and  of  Ennodius,  mentioned  above.^ 

*  The  sources  for  this  period  have  been  brought  together  and  trans- 
lated into  English  by  Prof.  C.  H.  Hayes,  An  Introduction  to  the 
Sources  relating  to  the  Germanic  Invasions  (1909). 


l68  THE  NEW  HISTORY 


IV 


Let  us  turn  now  to  the  disruption  of  the  Empire. 
It  is  commonly  asserted  that  the  State  was  divided 
into  two  distinct  parts  upon  the  death  of  Theodosius 
(in  395),  who  left  an  Eastern  Empire  to  his  elder  son 
Arcadius,  and  a  Western  Empire  to  Honorius.  This 
notion  is  so  inveterate  and  so  commonly  repeated  with 
more  or  less  elaboration  in  our  manuals  that  it  scarcely 
needs  to  be  illustrated.  I  take  the  following  state- 
ments from  two  much-used  textbooks,  not  because 
they  are  more  wrong  than  the  others,  but  because 
they  present  conveniently  and  clearly  what  seems 
to  be  an  erroneous  conception  of  the  facts. 

On  the  death  of  Theodosius  the  Empire  was  again  divided 
between  his  two  sons,  Arcadius  and  Honorius.  This  marks 
the  final  separation  in  fact  of  the  East  from  the  West;  after 
this  it  is  proper  to  speak  of  two  Roman  Empires.  The  eastern 
lasted  for  over  a  thousand  years ;  the  western  began  to  crumble 
almost  at  once  and  had  disappeared  as  an  empire  within  a  cen- 
tury. 

Under  the  caption  "Final  Division  of  the  Empire," 
in  decisive,  heavy-faced  type,  another  writer  says :  — 

The  Roman  world  was  united  for  the  last  time  under  Theo- 
dosius the  Great ;  from  a.d.  392  to  395  he  ruled  as  sole  emperor. 
Just  before  his  death  Theodosius  divided  the  Empire  between 
his  two  sons,  Arcadius  and  Honorius,  assigning  the  former,  who 
was  eighteen  years  of  age,  the  government  of  the  East,  and  giving 
the  latter,  a  mere  child  of  eleven,  the  sovereignty  of  the  West. 
This  was  the  final  partition  of  the  Roman  Empire,  —  the  issue 


"THE  FALL  OF  ROME"  169 

of  that  growing  tendency  which  we  have  observed  in  its  immod- 
erately extended  dominions  to  break  a.pa.Tt.  The  separate  his- 
tory of  the  East  and  West  now  begins. 

Three,  at  least,  of  the  chief  assertions  made  above 
are  wholly  erroneous.  The  Roman  Empire  was  not 
divided  but  remained  one ;  Theodosius  had  never  been 
sole  emperor ;  and  in  no  sense  does  the  separate  his- 
tory of  the  East  and  West  begin  with  the  death  of 
Theodosius.  A  contemporary  would  have  seen  noth- 
ing epoch-making  in  the  fact  that  Arcadius  and  Hono- 
rius  succeeded  their  father,  for  Arcadius  had  been 
emperor  as  one  of  his  father's  colleagues  for  eleven  years 
and  Honorius  for  three.  In  the  codes  a  number  of 
laws  are  preserved,  duly  issued  in  the  names  of  both 
father  and  sons.  The  fullest  account,  perhaps,  that 
we  have  of  this  alleged  division  is  in  Orosius,  who  says 
quite  simply,  "In  the  year  of  the  City  1149  Emperor 
Arcadius,  whose  son  Theodosius  [II]  now  rules  the 
East,  and  Emperor  Honorius,  his  brother,  upon  whom 
the  Commonwealth  still  rests,  began  to  exercise  their 
common  control  over  the  realm,  only  with  separate 
capitals  "  {Commune  imperium  diuersis  tantum  sedibus 
tenere  coeperunt,  Bk.  VII,  36).  Zosimus  is  still 
more  concise:  "The  Emperor  Theodosius,  having 
consigned  Italy,  Spain,  Celtica,  and  Lybia  to  his  son 
Honorius,  died  of  a  disease  upon  his  journey  towards 
Constantinople." 

Orosius  describes  the  conditions  with  perfect  accu- 
racy as  they  are  illustrated  by  the  habits  of  the  period 


I70  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

and  by  the  laws  in  the  Theodosian  and  Justinian  codes. 
From  the  time  of  Marcus  Aurehus,  who  chose  Verus 
as  his  colleague  in  the  year  i6i,  down  to  Diocletian, 
the  laws  of  the  Empire  were  not  uncommonly  issued 
in  the  name  of  two  or  more  emperors.  The  plurality 
of  emperors  became  the  general  rule  after  Diocletian, 
and  most  of  the  edicts  are  issued  in  the  name  of  two, 
three,  or  even  four  Augusti. 

The  existence  at  the  same  time  of  two  or  more  per- 
sons who  enjoyed  the  supreme  prerogatives  of  Roman 
emperor  seems  to  us  nowadays  a  contradiction  in 
terms.  It  did  not  seem  so  to  the  Romans,  who  had 
been  accustomed,  under  their  consuls  and  tribunes, 
from  a  very  early  time  to  the  spectacle  of  two  or  more 
officials  possessing  exactly  the  same  high  prerogatives 
throughout  the  whole  territory  of  the  State,  with  only 
such  informal  division  of  responsibility  as  might  be 
agreed  upon  between  them.  The  relations  between 
two  or  more  emperors,  all  of  whom  were  supreme,  was 
determined  in  the  same  informal  fashion :  a  son  would 
naturally  be  subordinate  to  his  father;  the  younger 
and  less  distinguished  colleague  to  the  older  and  better 
known  one. 

The  whole  situation  becomes  quite  clear  when  we 
refer  to  the  accounts  which  Ammianus  Marcellinus 
has  given  us  of  imperial  elections  in  his  day.  Julian, 
it  should  be  remembered,  had  been  killed  near  Babylon 
in  363  ;  his  successor,  Jovian,  died  almost  immediately 
after  his  election. 


"THE  FALL  OF  ROME"  171 

The  fatal  course  of  events  having  culminated  thus  mourn- 
fully in  the  death  of  two  emperors  within  such  a  brief  interval, 
the  army,  having  paid  the  last  honors  to  the  dead  body  of  Jovian, 
which  was  sent  to  Constantinople  to  be  interred  among  the  other 
emperors,  advanced  toward  Nicaea,  where  the  chief  civil  and 
military  authorities  devoted  themselves  to  an  anxious  considera- 
tion of  the  serious  situation,  and,  as  some  of  them  harbored 
vain  hopes,  it  was  deemed  necessary  to  seek  for  a  ruler  of  dignity 
and  proved  wisdom. 

It  was  first  rumored  that  a  few  persons  were  whispering  the 
name  of  Equitius,  who  was  at  that  time  tribime  of  the  first  divi- 
sion of  the  Scutarii,  but  he  was  disapproved  by  the  more  in- 
fluential leaders  as  being  too  rough  and  boorish ;  and  their  in- 
clination rather  tended  towards  Januarius,  a  kinsman  of  Jovian, 
who  was  chief  commissary  of  the  camp  of  Illyricum.  However, 
he  also  was  rejected  because  he  was  at  a  distance,  and  Valen- 
tinian,  since  he  was  both  well  qualified  and  accessible,  was 
elected  by  unanimous  consent  of  all  men  and  the  manifest  favor 
of  the  Deity.  He  was  a  tribune  of  the  second  division  of  the 
Scutarii,  and  had  been  left  at  Ancyra,  it  having  been  arranged 
that  he  should  follow  afterwards.  And  because  no  one  denied 
that  this  choice  was  for  the  advantage  of  the  Empire,  messen- 
gers were  sent  to  beg  him  to  come  with  aU  speed ;  but  for  ten 
days  the  Commonwealth  was  without  a  ruler. 

Upon  Valentinian's  arrival  he  was  clothed  with  the 
imperial  robes  and  crowned  and  saluted  as  Augustus. 
But  as  he  attempted  to  speak,  the  soldiers  raised  an 
uproar,  urging  that  a  second  emperor  be  immediately 
elected ;  to  this  Valentinian  replied :  — 

I  neither  doubt  nor  question  that  there  are  many  and  ex- 
cellent reasons  why  in  all  serious  emergencies  a  colleague  should 
be  chosen  to  share  the  imperial  power ;  and,  as  a  mere  man,  I 


172  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

myself  do  fear  the  great  accumulation  of  cares  which  must  be 
mine  and  the  various  events  which  may  occur.  .  .  .  Fortune 
will,  I  trust,  aid  me  while  I  diligently  search  for  a  wise  and  tem- 
perate partner. 

On  reaching  Constantinople,  Valentinian,  pondering 
upon  the  burden  of  urgent  responsibilities  which  threat- 
ened to  overwhelm  him,  decided  to  delay  no  longer, 
and  accordingly  led  his  brother  Valens  into  a  suburb 

where  with  the  consent  of  all  men  —  and  indeed  no  one  dared  to 
object  —  he  declared  him  emperor ;  had  him  clothed  in  imperial 
robes  and  crowned  with  a  diadem,  and  then  brought  him  back 
in  the  same  carriage  with  himself  as  the  legitimate  partner  of 
his  power,  though,  in  fact,  he  was  more  like  an  obedient  servant, 
as  the  remainder  of  my  narrative  wUl  show. 

At  this  time  the  trvimpet,  as  it  were,  gave  the  signal  for  war 
throughout  the  whole  Roman  world,  and  the  barbarian  tribes 
on  our  frontier  were  moved  to  make  invasions  into  the  territory 
lying  nearest.  The  Allemani  laid  waste  Gavd  and  Rhaetia ;  at 
the  same  time  the  Sarmatae  and  Quadi  ravaged  Pannonia ;  the 
Picts,  Saxons,  Scots,  and  Attacotti  brought  incessant  woes  upon 
the  Britons ;  the  Austoriani  and  other  Moorish  tribes  attacked 
Africa  with  more  than  usual  violence ;  predatory  bands  of  the 
Goths  plxmdered  Thrace. 

After  the  winter  had  passed  away 

the  two  emperors,  in  perfect  harmony,  one  having  been  duly 
raised  to  power,  the  other  having  been,  in  appearance  at  least, 
associated  in  his  honors,  having  traversed  Thrace,  arrived  at 
Naessus,  where  they  divided  the  counts  [i.e.  miltary  command- 
ers] between  them  as  if  they  were  going  to  separate.  .  .  .  After 
this  when  the  two  brothers  entered  Sermium  they  divided  the 


"THE  FALL  OF  ROME"  173 

court  [pdatium]  also,  and  Valentinian  as  chief  proceeded  to 
Milan,  while  Valens  retired  to  Constantinople. 

Later,  Valentinian  during  his  campaign  in  Gaul  fell 
ill,  and  a  certain  Rusticus  Julianus,  a  government 
official,  was  proposed  for  future  emperor;  but  others 
advocated  Severus,  an  infantry  captain. 

But  all  these  plans  were  formed  to  no  purpose,  for  in  the 
meantime  the  emperor,  through  the  variety  of  remedies  applied, 
recovered  and,  realizing  that  he  had  been  snatched  from  the 
jaws  of  death,  proposed  to  invest  his  son  Gratian,  who  was  now 
on  the  point  of  arriving  at  manhood,  with  the  ensigns  of  imperial 
authority;  everything  was  accordingly  prepared  and  the  sol- 
diers made  "solid"  [milile  firmato].  Immediately  upon  the  ar- 
rival of  Gratian,  Valentinian,  in  order  that  aU  men  might  will- 
ingly accept  the  new  emp>eror,  advanced  into  the  open  space, 
mounted  the  tribune,  and,  surrounded  by  a  brilliant  circle  of 
nobles  and  officers,  took  the  boy  by  the  hand  and  in  a  speech 
introduced  their  future  sovereign  to  the  army. 

When,  seven  years  later,  Valentinian  died, 

it  was  decided,  upon  careful  consideration,  that  the  son  of  the 
deceased  emperor,  —  also  Valentinian  by  name,  —  who  was  then 
a  boy  four  years  old,  should  succeed  to  the  imperial  pKJwer.  He 
was  at  that  time  one  hundred  miles  oflf,  living  with  his  mother, 
Justina,  in  a  small  town  called  Murocinta.  This  decision  was 
ratified  by  the  unanimous  consent  of  aU  parties,  and  Cercales,  his 
vmcle,  was  sent  with  speed  to  Murocinta,  where  he  placed  the 
royal  child  on  a  litter  and  so  brought  him  to  the  capital.  On 
the  sixth  day  after  his  father's  death  he  was  declared  lawful 
emperor  and  saluted  as  Augustus,  with  the  usual  solemnities. 
And  at  the  time  many  persons  thought  that  Gratian  would  be 
indignant  that  any  one  else  had  been  appointed  emperor  without 


174  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

his  permission ;  yet  afterwards,  when  all  fear  and  anxiety  were 
allayed,  they  lived  in  greater  security  because  he,  wise  and  kind- 
hearted  man  as  he  was,  loved  his  young  relative  with  exceeding 
affection  and  reared  him  with  great  care. 

These  passages  ^  illustrate  very  clearly  the  informal 
methods  of  electing  and  multiplying  emperors.  There 
was,  it  will  be  noted,  no  attempt  to  divide  the  realm 
among  them ;  if  there  were  several  emperors,  all  were 
supposed  to  busy  themselves  with  the  common  welfare 
of  the  whole  Empire. 

The  conditions  under  which  Theodosius  and  his  two 
sons  ruled  were  precisely  similar.  No  one  thought 
of  disrupting  the  Empire ;  there  was  but  one  Common- 
wealth (res  publico),  although  there  had  been  two 
capitals  since  the  founding  of  New  Rome  by  Con- 
stantine.  There  were  two  senates,  two  completely 
organized  imperial  courts,  but  the  Empire,  whatever 
might  be  the  number  of  rulers,  was  a  single  state.  A 
new  emperor,  when  elected,  regularly  requested  his 
colleague  or  colleagues  to  accept  him,  and  after  the 
time  of  Theodosius  one  emperor  regularly  chose  one 
of  the  annual  consuls  and  the  other  one  the  other ;  all 
laws  were  issued  in  the  name  and  with  the  consent  of 
all  the  Augusti  who  happened  to  be  reigning. 

Viewed  then  from  the  standpoint  of  custom,  there 
was  nothing  exceptional  in  the  arrangement  made 
after  the  death  of  Theodosius;    the  Empire  was  not 

*  They  are  taken  from  Bk.  XXVI,  ch.  i,  3-5,  ch.  ii,  8,  ch.  iv,  3-5, 
ch.  V,  I,  4;    Bk.  XXVII,  ch.  vi,  1-5 ;  Bk.  XXX,  ch.  x,  4-6. 


"THE  FALL  OF  ROME"  175 

divided  except  for  administrative  purposes,  and  there 
was  little,  if  anything,  that  was  novel  in  that.  No 
"Western  Empire"  was  created,  and  consequently 
there  was  no  "Western  Empire"  to  fall  in  476. 


On  the  death  of  Theodosius  we  find  three  military 
poUticians  of  German,  or  semi- German,  extraction  in 
charge  of  the  forces  of  the  Empire,  —  Stilicho,  the 
Vandal,  Gainas,  a  Goth,  and  Alaric,  also  a  Goth,  who 
had  been  assisting  Theodosius  in  his  last  campaign. 
The  only  way  to  understand  the  peculiar  position  of 
these  leaders  is  by  noting  their  conduct  in  such  detail 
as  it  is  described  to  us  by  Zosimus,  who  gives  us  the 
fullest  account  of  the  years  immediately  following  the 
death  of  Theodosius.  We  have  no  reason  to  sup- 
pose that  his  report  of  the  necessarily  dark  and  uncer- 
tain intrigues  which  were  carried  on  is  absolutely 
correct;  yet  the  general  spirit  of  the  situation  is 
clear,  and  he  certainly  says  enough  to  rectify  many 
current  misapprehensions  in  regard  to  the  relations 
of  the  barbarians  and  the  Romans. 

It  must  always  be  remembered  that  there  was  no 
sharp  line  of  demarcation  between  the  heterogeneous 
inhabitants  of  the  Roman  Empire  and  the  Germans, 
or  even  the  Huns.  Probably  no  questions  were  asked 
about  a  man's  origin  so  long  as  he  fitted  fairly 
into  the  place  that  he  affected  to  fill.    The  situation 


176  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

for  several  hundred  years  before  the  time  of  Theo» 
dosius  had  been  similar  to  that  which  now  exists 
in  the  United  States,  especially  in  the  city  of  New 
York.  A  foreigner,  as  foreigner,  is  at  no  disadvantage 
here ;  there  are  no  artificial  obstacles  put  in  his  way ; 
and  so,  in  the  time  of  Theodosius,  the  Germans  drifted 
into  the  Empire  in  much  the  same  way  that  the  various 
foreign  nations  are  drifting  into  the  United  States. 
They  mingled  with  the  Roman  citizens  in  the  same  man- 
ner that  aliens  mingle  to-day  with  our  people,  anxious 
to  be  reckoned  American  citizens  as  speedily  as  pos- 
sible. There  was  no  lining  up  of  Roman  against 
barbarian  ;  the  barbarian  gladly  fought  for  the  Roman 
against  his  own  people  and  exhibited  very  few  traces 
of  national  feeling.  We  have  little  or  no  information 
in  regard  to  intermarriage  among  the  lower  ranks  of 
society,  but  it  is  obvious  that  in  the  highest  rank 
there  was  no  prejudice  against  mixed  alliances.  To 
cite  only  a  few  examples :  we  find  Theodosius  giving 
his  favorite  niece  in  marriage  to  Stilicho,  and  Stilicho 
both  his  daughters  in  succession  to  Honorius.  Arca- 
dius  married  Eudoxia,  the  fair  daughter  of  the  Frank- 
ish  leader,  Bauto,  and  in  due  time  Theodosius's  daugh- 
ter, Placidia,  allied  herself  with  Alaric's  brother-in- 
law  and  successor,  Athaulf  (or  Adolphus). 

Zosimus  tells  us  that  Theodosius  the  Great,  imme- 
diately after  his  accession,  began  to  conciliate  the 
more  important  barbarian  leaders,  whom  he  treated 
with  distinguished  consideration,   and  even  invited 


"THE  FALL  OF  ROME"  177 

to  his  own  table.  He  was  known  as  the  friend  of  the 
Goths,  with  whom  he  hved  on  happy  terms,  naming 
Alaric  and  Gainas  as  his  commanders  and  settling  a 
considerable  number  of  the  East  Goths  in  the  fertile 
lands  of  Phrygia.  It  must  be  observed,  too,  that 
there  was  absolutely  nothing  novel  in  this  procedure, 
which  was  entirely  in  accord  with  the  habits  of  the 
Empire  for  centuries.  Perhaps  the  whole  situation 
is  best  illustrated  by  the  conditions  which  led  to  the 
capture  of  Rome  by  Alaric  in  the  year  410. 

There  had  been  for  some  years  an  active  rivalry 
between  the  various  barbarian  commanders,  who 
played  the  same  important  role  in  the  politics  of  the 
time  that  our  ahen  politicians  do  in  our  municipal 
affairs  at  the  present  day.  Stilicho,  Gainas,  and 
Alaric  had  each  been  working  for  his  own  advantage. 
Alaric,  almost  immediately  after  the  death  of  Theo- 
dosius,  had  made  an  incursion  into  Greece,  where 
he  had  been  weakly  opposed  by  Stihcho;  he  had 
returned  to  the  north  and  received  some  definite 
appointment  in  the  Roman  army.  Just  what  this 
appointment  was  we  cannot  be  sure,  since  Claudian 
only  speaks  vaguely  of  Alaric 's  having  charge  of  the 
armories.  StiUcho  was  very  active  and  ambitious; 
he  defeated  Radagaisus  and  his  army  of  barbarians, 
but  in  carrying  out  his  later  plans  he  appears  to  have 
encouraged  the  Vandals  and  Suevi  to  cross  the  Rhine 
into  Gaul.  As  for  Alaric,  his  first  attempt  to  invade 
Italy  in  402  was  repelled  by  one  of  Stilicho's  barbarian 


178  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

lieutenants,  Saulus,  but  the  court  party,  a  few  years 
later  (in  408),  induced  Honorius  to  execute  Stilicho. 
Zosimus  tells  us  that  after  the  execution  of  Stilicho 
many  of  the  barbarians  in  Rome  were  killed,  where- 
upon the  survivors  organized  an  army  of  thirty 
thousand  men  and  invited  Alaric  to  join  them. 

Alaric  was  not,  however,  anxious  for  war ;  he  wanted 
some  sort  of  an  ofl&ce,  with  a  due  amount  of  power  and 
comfortable  emoluments.  He  was  ready  upon  very 
moderate  terms  to  retire  with  his  followers  into  Pan- 
nonia.  The  emperor  Honorius  failed,  however,  to 
come  to  terms,  showing  a  culpable  indecision,  where- 
upon Alaric  summoned  his  wife's  brother,  Athaulf, 
from  upper  Pannonia,  where  he  had  a  considerable 
army  of  Goths  and  Huns.  He  then  moved  down  to- 
ward Rome,  to  which  he  laid  siege.  But  the  city 
bought  itself  off  with  5000  pounds  of  gold,  30,000 
pounds  of  silver,  4000  silk  robes,  3000  scarlet  fleeces, 
and  3000  pounds  of  pepper.  Alaric  once  more  de- 
clared himself  ready  to  enter  into  an  alliance  with  the 
emperor  and  the  city  of  Rome  against  all  their  ene- 
mies. The  barbarians  then  withdrew  from  Rome, 
but  as  they  retired  they  were  Joined  by  almost  all  the 
slaves  of  the  city  to  the  number  of  forty  thousand. 
This  is  suggestive  of  the  highly  miscellaneous  char- 
acter of  the  persons  who  composed  the  alleged  "Ger- 
manic peoples,"  within  the  Roman  Empire. 

Honorius  refused  to  conclude  a  definite  peace  with 
Alaric,  but  his  judicious  prefect  of  the  court,  Jovius, 


"THE  FALL  OF  ROME"  179 

resolved  to  send  ambassadors  to  Alaric  to  request  him  to  come 
to  Ravenna,  and  told  him  they  would  conclude  peace.  Alaric, 
being  prevailed  upon  by  letters  he  received  from  both  the  em- 
peror and  Jovius,  advanced  as  far  as  Ariminirai,  thirty  miles  from 
Ravenna.  Jovius,  who  had  been  a  friend  and  intimate  acquaint- 
ance of  Alaric  in  Epirus,  hastened  thence  to  treat  with  him. 
The  demands  of  Alaric  were  a  certain  quantity  of  gold  each  year, 
a  supply  of  grain,  and  permission  for  him  and  the  barbarians 
who  were  with  him  to  inhabit  both  the  Venetias,  Noriami,  and 
Dalmatia.  Jovius,  having  written  down  these  demands  in  the 
presence  of  Alaric,  sent  them  to  the  Emperor  with  other  letters 
which  he  privately  dispatched  to  him,  advising  him  to  appoint 
Alaric  commander  of  both  the  cavalry  and  infantry,  by  which 
means  he  might  be  induced  to  reduce  his  demands  and  make 
peace  on  moderate  terms. 

Honorius,  however,  still  refused  to  ratify  the  pro- 
posed terms.  Alaric,  irritated  by  his  failure  to  get 
a  more  advantageous  position  in  the  Roman  service, 
proposed  to  march  once  more  on  Rome.  The  news, 
however,  that  Honorius  had  called  to  his  aid  ten 
thousand  Huns,  led  Alaric  to  repent  his  haste,  and  he 
sent  the  bishops  of  the  various  towns  which  he  had 
been  occupying  to  expostulate  with  Honorius, 

to  say  that  the  barbarians  cared  for  no  offices,  that  they  would 
settle  in  the  Noricums,  which  were  harassed  by  continual  in- 
vasions, and  that  they  would  accept  such  annual  allowance  of 
grain  as  the  emperor  might  think  fit,  and  would  remit  the  gold. 
Moreover,  that  a  friendship  or  alUance  should  subsist  between 
himself  and  the  Romans  against  every  one  who  should  rise  up 
against  the  Empire. 


l8o  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

These  terms  Zosimus  declares  to  have  been  very 
reasonable,  and  he  deplores  the  want  of  wisdom  on 
the  part  of  Honorius  in  rejecting  them. 

The  reader,  familiar  only  with  the  ordinary  ac- 
counts of  the  "wanderings  of  the  nations,"  will  natu- 
rally be  surprised  to  learn  that  the  Romans  had  thus 
early  begun  to  employ  the  Huns  as  mercenaries,  and 
will  also  be  surprised  at  the  courteous  and  deliberate 
negotiations  carried  on  by  Alaric  through  the  clergy. 
Alaric,  of  course,  had  probably  lived  a  great  part  of 
his  life  in  the  Roman  Empire  and  was  no  more  of  a 
barbarian  than  hundreds  of  the  Roman  military  and 
civil  officers  of  the  time.  He  evidently  would  have 
been  satisfied  could  he  have  occupied  a  position  similar 
to  that  which  Stilicho  had  enjoyed  under  Theodosius. 

Insulted  by  the  refusal  of  Honorius  to  meet  his 
advances,  Alaric  once  more  laid  siege  to  Rome.  He 
cut  off  its  supplies  from  Africa  and  demanded  that 
the  city  join  him  against  the  emperor,  who  had  fled 
to  Ravenna. 

The  whole  senate  [Zosimus  says],  having  therefore  assembled 
and  having  deliberated  about  what  course  they  should  follow, 
complied  with  all  of  Alaric's  demands.  .  .  .  They  received  his 
embassy  and  invited  him  to  their  city,  and,  as  he  commanded, 
placed  Attains,  the  prefect  of  the  city,  on  an  imperial  throne  in 
a  purple  robe  and  crown.  Attalus  then  appointed  Lampadius 
prefect  of  palaces,  Marcianus  prefect  of  the  city,  and  gave  the 
command  to  Alaric  and  a  certain  Valens,  who  formerly  com- 
manded the  Dalmatian  legions,  distributing  the  other  oflfices 
in  a  proper  fashion. 


"THE  FALL  OF  ROME"  l8l 

Attalus  promised  arrogantly  to  subdue  the  whole 
world.  This  so  delighted  the  Romans  that  they  were 
''  full  of  joy,  having  not  only  acquired  new  magistrates 
well  acquainted  with  the  management  of  affairs, 
but  likewise  Tertullus,  with  whose  promotion  to  the 
consulship  they  were  exceedingly  gratified."  But 
the  inefficiency  of  Attalus  in  maintaining  communica- 
tion with  Africa,  from  whence  the  supplies  for  Rome 
came,  led  to  his  speedy  deposition  by  Alaric.  He 
took  Attalus  to  the  city  of  Ariminum,  where  he  then 
resided,  and  stripping  him  of  diadem  and  purple  robe, 
sent  them  to  the  emperor  Honorius. 

It  thus  appears  that  Alaric,  instead  of  sweeping 
down  upon  the  capital  of  the  world  at  the  head  of  the 
great  Visigothic  nation,  was  pathetically  anxious  to 
carry  out  his  purposes  in  a  peaceful  fashion.  When 
he  found  that  he  could  not  manage  an  emperor  of 
his  own,  he  was  ready  once  more  to  open  negotiations 
with  Honorius.  The  rather  full  report  which  Zosimus 
gives,  based  very  probably  upon  the  contemporaneous 
Greek  writer,  Olympiodorus,  breaks  oflf  at  this  point, 
and  we  do  not  know  exactly  what  led  Alaric  finally 
to  lay  siege  once  more  to  Rome. 

The  elaborate  account  in  several  pages  which  Gib- 
bon gives  of  the  sack  of  Rome  is  largely  the  product 
of  his  reconstructive  imagination.  From  the  con- 
temporaries we  learn  next  to  nothing.  Orosius,  then 
a  young  man,  anxious  to  prove  that  Christian  influ- 
ence, instead  of  precipitating  the  capture  of  the  city, 


l82  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

served  to  shield  many  persons  from  the  violence  of 
Alaric's  followers,  gives  one  or  two  instances  of  the 
respect  shown  by  the  Goths  toward  the  holy  edifices, 
and  alleges  that  the  barbarians  retired  voluntarily 
on  the  third  day,  having  burned  a  few  houses.  ''Re- 
cent as  is  the  event,"  he  declares,  writing  less  than  ten 
years  after,  "no  one  would  suppose  now  that  anything 
had  happened  in  Rome  except  for  the  ruin  of  a  few 
structures"  (nisi  adhtic  aliquantis  existentibus  ex 
incendio  minis  forte  doceatur). 

As  the  prefect  of  the  city,  RutiHus  Namatianus, 
was  leaving  Rome  some  five  years  after  Alaric's 
occupation,  he  burst  into  song,  and  in  elegiac  verse 
greets  the  beautiful  queen  of  the  world  as  she  reposed 
in  her  glory  on  the  banks  of  the  Tiber.  There  is 
no  lament  over  recent  havoc,  but  only  a  confident 
prophecy  of  Rome's  eternal  and  universal  empire. 

Procopius,  a  writer  of  Justinian's  time,  over  a  cen- 
tury later,  gives  in  his  Vandalic  War  a  very  contra- 
dictory account  of  how  Alaric  took  the  city.  Some 
allege,  he  tells  us,  that  the  Gothic  king  sent  a  gift 
of  three  hundred  handsome  youths  to  the  nobility 
of  the  city;  these  young  men,  when  their  masters 
were  asleep  after  dinner,  opened  the  gates  to  their 
fellows;  but  others  claim,  he  adds,  that  the  gates 
.  were  opened  by  a  matron  of  the  senatorial  class, 
Proba,  who,  out  of  pity  for  the  poor  of  the  city,  who 
were  reduced  to  cannibalism,  ordered  her  servants  to 
admit  the  enemy  by  night. 


"THE  FALL  OF  ROME"  183 

Gibbon's  plan  of  extracting  ''from  the  improbable 
story  of  Procopius  the  circumstances  which  had  an 
air  of  probability"  was,  of  course,  hazardous  in  the 
extreme.  The  two  accounts  which  Procopius  gives 
are  not  only  improbable,  —  they  are  perfectly  con- 
tradictory. It  may  be  added  that  it  is  to  Procopius 
alone  that  we  owe  the  oft-repeated  anecdote  of 
Honorius  and  his  hen,  Roma.  While  the  historic 
basis  of  the  anecdote  is  obviously  of  the  slightest, 
it  is  one  which  perhaps  merits  perpetuation  on  account 
of  its  inherent  charm. 

Alaric  died,  as  we  all  know,  soon  after  he  left  Rome 
on  his  way  southward  to  insure  communication  be- 
tween Rome  and  Africa,  for  Rome  was  dependent  on 
Africa  for  its  food  supply.  His  successor,  Athaulf, 
married  his  hostage,  the  half-sister  of  Honorius,  and 
carried  on,  first  in  Italy  and  then  in  Gaul,  a  series 
of  political  intrigues  very  similar  to  those  of  his  de- 
ceased brother-in-law,  Alaric.  Attains  was  once  more 
set  up  as  emperor  and  again  given  up  as  a  failure,  so 
that  Orosius  speaks  humorously  of  this  weak  tool  of 
the  Gothic  kings  as  "made,  unmade,  remade,  and  de- 
made"  {facto,  infecto,  refecto,  defecto).  Orosius  also 
reports  a  remarkable  saying  of  Athaulf  : 

At  first  [Athaulf  was  wont  to  say]  I  ardently  desired  that  the 
Roman  name  should  be  obliterated  and  that  all  Roman  soil 
should  be  converted  into  an  empire  of  the  Goths  and  be  so  called ; 
I  longed  that  "Romania,"  to  use  a  common  expression,  should 
become  Gothia,  and  Athaulf  be  what  Cassar  Augustus  was.    But 


184  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

I  have  been  taught  by  much  experience  that  the  unbridled 
license  of  the  Goths  will  never  admit  of  their  obeying  laws,  and 
without  laws  a  state  is  not  a  state.  I  have  therefore  assumed 
the  safer  course  of  aspiring  to  the  glory  of  restoring  and  increas- 
ing the  Roman  name  by  Gothic  vigor ;  and  I  hope  to  be  handed 
down  to  posterity  as  the  initiator  of  the  Roman  restoration, 
since  it  is  impossible  for  me  to  change  the  form  of  the  Empire.^ 


VI 

After  we  are  deserted  by  Zosimus  and  Orosius,  the 
information  in  regard  to  the  fifth  century  becomes  very 
slight  indeed.  The  annals  are  meager  in  the  extreme, 
and  the  statements  of  Procopius,  written  long  after, 
are  very  unreliable.  It  is  clear,  however,  that  the 
successive  barbarian  chieftains  continued  to  negotiate 
with  one  another  and  with  the  Empire  in  the  same 
way  that  they  had  in  the  time  of  Stilicho  and  Alaric. 
It  is  evident,  too,  that  the  West  Gothic  kings  main- 
tained the  general  form  of  the  old  government,  its 
administration  and  laws.  We  know  less  about  the 
little  Burgundian  kingdom;  and  such  accoimts  as 
we  have  of  the  Vandals  in  northern  Africa  were  written 
by  orthodox  Christians  who  were  particularly  occupied 
with  the  horrors  of  the  Arian  doctrines  which  the 
barbarians  professed. 

In  Italy,  after  Stilicho,  the  most  important  mili- 
tary leader  for  a  long  period  was  the  "patrician," 
^tius.     He  had  had  long  experience  at  the  Hunnish 

*  Adversutn  Paganos,  Bk.  VH,  43. 


"THE  FALL  OF  ROME"  185 

court,  had  been  at  the  head  of  Himnish  mercenaries, 
and  was  well  qualified  to  organize  the  successful  alli- 
ance against  Attila  which  led  to  his  defeat  in  eastern 
Gaul  in  451.  He  was  followed  by  Ricimer,  who  en- 
joyed the  title  of  "patrician"  and  exercised  functions 
analogous  to  those  of  a  New  York  boss. 

After  the  death  of  the  inefficient  Valentinian  III, 
in  455,  emperors  succeeded  one  another  in  the  West 
with  startling  rapidity.  Maximus,  who  is  said  to  have 
killed  Valentinian  III,  was  himself  killed  within  a  few 
months ;  and  in  the  same  year,  455,  we  have  reigning 
for  a  brief  time  Avitus,  the  candidate  of  the  West 
Gothic  king,  Theodoric  II.  It  was  necessary,  however, 
to  find  a  more  efficient  man  to  oppose  the  Vandals 
who  were  now  threatening  Rome  from  Africa,  and 
Boss  Ricimer  consented  to  the  selection  of  Majorian 
as  emperor  (455-461).  He  was  a  well-meaning  com- 
mander, who  had  formerly  been  associated  with  Rici- 
mer. His  chief  distinction  is  perhaps  the  part  he 
played  as  "  the  man  with  the  muck  rake,"  since  his 
arraignment  of  the  official  corruption  of  the  times 
would  have  been  gratefully  received  and  well  paid  for 
had  there  been  an  Everybody s  Magazine  or  McClure's 
to  promulgate  his  exposures.  But  Ricimer  was 
dissatisfied  with  him,  and  in  461  he  substituted 
Severus,  who  reigned  four  years,  but  about  whom 
the  records  give  us  no  information.  After  the  death 
of  Severus,  Ricimer  took  no  steps  to  fill  his  place, 
and  two  years  elapsed  before  the  emperor  in  the  East, 


l86  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

Leo,  associated  with  himself  a  family  comiection, 
Anthemius.  We  have  in  Ennodius's  Life  of  Bishop 
Epiphanius  a  rather  lively  account  of  the  relations 
between  the  new  emperor  and  the  barbarian  boss. 
Ennodius  declares  that  Ricimer  conducted  the  com- 
monwealth second  only  to  Anthemius ;  that  Ricimer 
regarded  Anthemius  as  a  sHppery  fellow,  and  Anthe- 
mius on  his  part  declared  Ricimer  a  hairy  barbarian 
with  whom  no  one  could  get  on.  In  472  Ricimer  set 
up  an  anti-emperor,  Olybrius,  but  both  emperors 
were  carried  off  the  same  year  by  disease. 

The  next  year  a  new  candidate  for  emperor  ap- 
peared. Glycerins,  an  enterprising  soldier  who  was 
supported  by  the  Burgimdian  king.  At  the  same  time 
Julius  Nepos,  who  was  in  command  in  Dalmatia, 
assumed  the  imperial  title  with  the  sanction  of  the 
emperor  Zeno  at  Constantinople.  The  annals  tell 
us  succinctly  enough  that  at  Tortus,  near  Rome, 
Glycerins  was  made  bishop,  while  Nepos  became  em- 
peror. On  the  death  of  Ricimer  a  new  and  expe- 
rienced barbarian  leader,  Orestes,  who  had  formerly 
been  Attila's  secretary,  became  "patrician,"  and  he 
it  was  who  made  his  little  son,  Romulus  Augustulus, 
emperor  at  a  time  when  there  were  already  two 
emperors  in  the  West,  Glycerins  and  Nepos,  while 
Zeno  was  repelling  a  rival  in  the  East. 

It  has  been  necessary  to  review  the  circumstances 
which  led  up  to  the  famous  deposition  of  the  little 
Romulus,  in  order  to  see  the  whole  bearing  of  an 


"THE   FALL  OF  ROME"  187 

event  which  has  long  been  viewed  as  s3aionymous  with 
the  fall  of  the  "Western  Empire."  Let  us  see  now 
just  what  information  the  contemporaries  give  us  in 
regard  to  the  events  of  the  year  476.  It  is  hardly 
necessary  to  say  that  none  of  our  information  comes 
from  any  one  who  claims  to  have  seen  anything  he 
narrates ;  most  of  it,  indeed,  comes  from  those  who  were 
far  removed  in  time"  or  space  from  the  scene  of  the 
events.  Cassiodorus,  the  famous  minister  of  Theo- 
doric,  was  not  born  till  some  years  after  476.  In  his 
Chronicle,  written  forty  years  later,  he  says  simply: 
"a.d.  475  —  This  year,  after  Nepos  had  fled  to  Dal- 
matia,  Orestes  gave  the  imperial  power  to  his  son 
Augustulus."  Under  476  he  says :  "During  this  con- 
sulate Orestes  and  his  brother  Paul  were  killed  by 
Odovacar,  who  assumed  the  title  of  king  but  did  not 
use  the  purple  or  royal  insignia."  It  would  seem  clear 
that  Cassiodorus  did  not  perceive  in  the  events  any- 
thing which  might  properly  be  regarded  as  suggesting 
the  fall  of  the  Empire. 

We  have  the  fullest  accovmt,  perhaps,  of  the  events 
in  a  fragment  of  an  Itahan  chronicle  by  some  unknown 
writer  of  about  the  middle  of  the  sixth  century.^  All 
we  know  of  him  is  that,  as  Mommsen  has  said,  he 
was  evidently  a  Christian  man  of  "almost  infantile 

*  The  so-called  "Valesian  fragment,"  which  owes  its  name  to  its 
French  editors  of  the  seventeenth  century,  the  Valois  (Valesii), 
may  be  found  at  the  end  of  the  Teubner  edition  of  Ammianus 
Marcellinus. 


l88  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

simplicity,"  with  a  style  bordering  on  illiteracy.    He 

writes  as  follows :  — 

While  Zeno,  the  Emperor,  was  reigning  at  Constantinople 
the  patrician  Nepos,  coming  suddenly  to  Portus,  deprived  Gly- 
cerius  of  imperial  power.  Glycerius  was  made  a  bishop  and 
Nepos  emperor  at  Rome.  Nepos  came  presently  to  Ravenna, 
but,  fearing  the  patrician  Orestes,  who  was  following  him  with 
an  army,  took  ship  and  fled  to  Salona.  There  he  remained  five 
years,  and  was  assassinated  by  his  own  followers. 

Soon  after  his  departure  Augustulus  was  made  emperor 
and  reigned  ten  years  [ !  ].  Augustulus,  who  before  his  reign  had 
been  called  Romulus  by  his  parents,  was  made  emperor  by  his 
father,  the  patrician  Orestes.  Odovacar,  however,  with  the 
people  of  the  Scyrri,  coming  suddenly  on  the  patrician  Orestes, 
killed  him  at  Piacenza,  and  afterwards  his  brother  Paul  in  the 
pine  woods  outside  Classis  [the  port  of  Ravenna].  He  took 
Ravenna,  moreover,  and  deposed  Augustulus,  but  had  compas- 
sion on  his  youth  and  beauty,  and  spared  his  life  besides  paying 
him  a  siim  of  six  thousand  solidi.  He  sent  him  into  Campania, 
where  he  lived  undisturbed  with  his  relatives  His  father, 
Orestes,  was  a  Pannonian,  who  had  attached  himself  to  Attila 
when  the  latter  came  into  Italy  and  had  been  made  his  sec- 
retary, whence  he  had  been  advanced  until  he  had  reached  the 
dignity  of  patrician. 

Procopius,  the  famous  historian  of  Justinian,  writ- 
ing about  550,  gives  a  little  more  detail,  but  he  tells  us 
nothing  of  his  sources,  and  his  data  were  collected 
some  seventy  years  after  the  events.  In  the  opening 
of  his  Gothic  War  he  says :  — 

\Wiile  Zeno  was  reigning  at  Byzantium  the  power  in  the 
West  was  held  by  the  Augustus  whom  the  Romans  nicknamed 


"THE  FALL  OF  ROME"  189 

Augustulus  because  he  succeeded  to  the  Empire  in  early  youth. 
His  father,  Orestes,  a  very  prudent  man,  was  regent.  Some 
time  previously  the  Romans  had  received  as  aUies  the  Scyrri  and 
Alani  and  other  Gothic  [German]  tribes,  after  the  defeats  they 
had  suffered  from  Alaric  and  AttUa,  of  whom  I  have  written  in 
former  books.  The  fame  of  the  Roman  soldiers  decreased  in 
proportion  as  that  of  the  barbarians  increased ;  and  under  the 
specious  name  of  "aUiance"  they  fell  under  the  tyrannical  sway 
of  the  intruders.  The  impudence  of  the  latter  grew  to  such  an 
extent  that  after  many  concessions  had  been  willingly  made  to 
their  needs,  they  at  length  wanted  to  divide  the  entire  arable 
land  of  Italy  among  themselves.  Of  this  they  demanded  a  third 
part  from  Orestes,  and  when  he  refused  them,  they  straightway 
slew  him.  Among  these  barbarians  was  a  certain  imperial 
guardsman,  Odovacar,  by  name,  who  then  promised  them  the 
fulfillment  of  their  desires  if  they  would  appoint  him  to  the  com- 
mand. After  he  had  thus  usurped  the  rule  he  did  no  other  injury 
to  the  emperor,  but  allowed  him  to  live  as  a  private  citizen.  To 
the  barbarians  he  handed  over  the  third  of  all  arable  land,  by 
which  act  he  assured  their  devotion  to  himself ;  and  he  held  his 
usurped  power  ten  years. 

In  the  vast  collection  of  extracts  prepared  at  the  order 
of  the  learned  emperor  Constantine  Porphyrogenitus 
in  the  tenth  century  we  have  a  fragment  from  the 
historian  Malchus,  of  Philadelphia  in  Syria,  who  pre- 
pared a  history  covering  the  period  from  474  to  480. 
He  wrote  in  the  early  part  of  the  sixth  century  and 
thus  reports  an  embassy  sent  by  the  Roman  senate  to 
the  emperor  in  the  East,  asking  that  Odovacar  be 
made  "patrician,"  a  title  which  the  barbarian  bosses 
had  commonly  enjoyed  during  the  previous  decades. 
The  extract  is  interesting  for  many  reasons  and,  as  I 


I90  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

shall  show,  furnishes  an  instance  of  the  carelessness, 
bordering  upon  unscrupulousness,  which  may  now 
and  then  be  noted  in  the  writings  of  Gibbon  and 
others  of  equally  distinguished  scholarship. 

The  Greek  of  Malchus,  literally  translated,  reads  as 
follows :  — 

.  .  ,  Odovacar  compelled  the  senate  to  dispatch  an  em- 
bassy to  the  emperor  Zeno  to  inform  him  that  they  no  longer 
needed  an  emperor  of  their  own;  a  common  emperor  wovild  be 
sufficient  who  alone  should  be  supreme  niler  of  both  boundaries 
[of  the  empire] ;  that  they  had,  moreover,  chosen  Odovacar  to 
guard  their  interests,  since  he  had  an  understanding  of  both 
political  and  military  affairs.  They  therefore  begged  Zeno  to 
honor  him  with  the  title  of  patrician  and  to  commit  to  him  the 
diocese  of  the  Italians.  The  men  from  the  Roman  senate  ar- 
rived, bringing  this  message  to  Byzantimn. 

During  these  days  there  came  also  messengers  from  Nepos, 
who  were  to  congratulate  Zeno  on  what  had  taken  place  [namely, 
the  overthrow  of  his  rival  Basiliscus]  and  ask  him  at  the  same 
time  zealously  to  aid  Nepos,  who  had  been  suffering  in  the  same 
way  as  he,  to  regain  his  power,  by  supplying  money  and  an  army 
and  all  things  necessary  to  effect  his  restoration.  Those  who 
were  to  say  these  things  were  accordingly  dispatched  by  Nepos. 

But  Zeno  made  the  following  reply  to  the  men  from  the  senate, 
namely,  that  of  the  two  emperors  they  had  received  from  the 
East,  one  they  had  driven  out,  while  Anthemius  they  had  killed. 
What  should  be  done  under  the  circumstances  they  must  surely 
perceive.  So  long  as  an  emperor  still  lived  there  was  no  other 
policy  possible  except  that  they  should  receive  him  when  he 
returned. 

To  the  men  from  the  barbarian  [i.e.  Odovacar]  he  replied 
that  it  would  be  wise  for  Odovacar  to  receive  the  dignity  of  pa- 


"THE  FALL  OF  ROME"  19I 

trician  from  the  emperor  Nepos ;  but  that  he  himself  would  send 
it,  should  Nepos  not  anticipate  him ;  and  he  praised  Odovacar 
because  he  had  shown  a  tendency  to  preserve  the  order  estab- 
lished by  the  Romans,  and  trusted  therefore  that  Odovacar,  if 
he  wished  to  do  the  fair  thing,  would  receive  the  emperor  who 
had  paid  him  these  honors.  And  sending  a  royal  letter  to  Odo- 
vacar expressing  his  wishes,  he  addressed  him  as  patrician. 

Nothing  whatever  is  said  of  Romulus  Augustulus, 
who  has  really  no  claim  to  be  ranked  as  an  emperor, 
since  he  was  no  more  than  his  father's  (Orestes's) 
imsuccessful  candidate  for  the  office. 

We  have  now  reviewed  all  the  immediate  sources 
of  the  events  of  476.  Let  us  see,  then,  what  Gibbon,  in 
his  thirty-sixth  chapter,  makes  of  this  extract  from 
Malchus. 

Odoacer  had  resolved  to  abolish  that  useless  and  expensive 
office  [of  emperor] ;  and  such  is  the  weight  of  antique  prejudice 
that  it  required  some  boldness  and  penetration  to  discover  the 
extreme  facihty  of  the  enterprise.  The  unfortunate  Augustulus 
was  made  the  instnmient  of  his  own  disgrace ;  he  signified  his 
resignation  to  the  senate ;  and  that  assembly,  in  their  last  act 
of  obedience  to  a  Roman  prince,  still  aflFected  the  spirit  of  free- 
dom and  the  forms  of  the  constitution.  An  epistle  was  ad- 
dressed, by  their  unanimous  decree,  to  the  emperor  Zeno,  the 
son-in-law  and  successor  of  Leo,  who  had  lately  been  restored 
after  a  short  rebellion  to  the  Byzantine  throne.  They  solemnly 
"disclaim  the  necessity,  or  even  the  wish,  of  continuing  any 
longer  the  imperial  succession  in  Italy,  since,  in  their  opinion, 
the  majesty  of  a  sole  monarch  is  sufficient  to  p)ervade  and  protect, 
at  the  same  time,  both  the  East  and  the  West."  In  their  own 
name,  and  in  the  name  of  the  people,  they  consent  that  the  seat 


192  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

of  xiniversal  empire  shall  be  transferred  from  Rome  to  Constan- 
tinople ;  and  they  basely  renounce  the  right  of  choosing  their 
master,  the  only  vestige  that  yet  remained  of  the  authority  that 
had  given  laws  to  the  world.  The  Republic  (they  repeat  that 
name  without  a  blush)  might  safely  confide  in  the  civil  and  mili- 
tary virtues  of  Odoacer ;  and  they  humbly  request  that  the  em- 
peror would  invest  him  with  the  title  of  patrician  and  the  ad- 
ministration of  the  diocese  of  Italy. 

The  deputies  of  the  senate  were  received  at  Constantinople 
with  some  marks  of  displeasure  and  indignation.  .  .  .  But 
the  prudent  Zeno  soon  deserted  the  hopeless  cause  of  his  abdi- 
cated colleague  [namely,  Nepos].  His  vanity  was  flattered  by 
the  title  of  sole  emperor  and  by  the  statues  erected  to  his  honor 
in  the  several  quarters  of  Rome;  he  entertained  a  friendly 
though  ambiguous  correspondence  with  the  patrician  Odoacer ; 
and  he  gratefully  accepted  the  imperial  ensigns,  the  sacred  orna- 
ments of  the  throne  and  the  palace,  which  the  barbarian  was 
not  imwilling  to  remove  from  the  sight  of  the  people.  ^ 

It  will  be  observed  that  there  is  but  a  slight  resem- 
blance between  the  alleged  extract  from  Malchus, 
which  Gibbon  encloses  in  quotation  marks,  and  the 
literal  translation  of  the  Greek.  There  is,  in  the 
original,  no  mention  of  the  word  "Republic,"  and 
even  if  there  had  been,  Gibbon  must  have  known 
that  the  word  respuhlica,  or  its  equivalent  in  Greek, 
would  have  had  in  those  days  nothing  of  the  meaning 
of  "republic "  in  our  sense  of  the  word.  It  was  simply 
a  colorless  synonym  for  "state"  or  "commonwealth." 

Most  extraordinary  of  all  is  the  statement  that 
Zeno  "gratefully  accepted  the  imperial  ensigns,  the 

*  Vol.  IV,  pp.  50-51  of  Bury's  edition. 


"THE  FALL  OF  ROME"  1 93 

sacred  ornaments  of  the  throne  and  palace,  which  the 
barbarian  was  not  unwilling  to  remove  from  the  sight 
of  the  people."  Any  reader  would  infer  that  there 
was  some  evidence  of  the  transmission  by  Odovacar 
of  the  imperial  insignia  to  Constantinople.  As  a 
matter  of  fact  this  oft-repeated  story  is  practically 
without  foundation.  In  that  bit  of  ItaUan  chronicle 
already  quoted  (known  as  the  Valesian  fragment), 
resting  upon  an  entirely  different  basis  from  the  report 
of  Malchus,  we  find  the  statement  that  after  Theodoric 
had,  in  the  year  493,  killed  his  rival  Odovacar  he  made 
peace  with  the  emperor  Anastasius ;  that  Anastasius 
"returned  all  the  ornaments  of  the  palace  which 
Odovacar  had  sent  to  Constantinople,"  Whatever 
these  ornamenta  palatii  may  have  been  no  one  knows, 
—  the  bric-a-brac  from  the  parlor  mantelpiece,  for 
aught  we  can  say.  We  are  in  no  way  justified  in 
assuming  that  they  were  "the  imperial  insignia,"  and 
certainly  there  is  absolutely  no  evidence  that  they 
were  sent,  as  Gibbon  and  even  Hodgkin  assume,  at  the 
time  of  the  embassy  reported  by  Malchus. 

Now,  to  sum  up  our  review  of  a  momentous 
century,  it  becomes  clear,  as  we  examine  the  scanty 
bits  of  information  that  have  come  down  to  us,  that 
the  commonly  accepted  notions  of  the  progress  of 
affairs  during  the  break-up  of  the  western  portions  of 
the  Roman  Empire  in  the  fifth  century  are  apparently 
foundationless.  (i)  Theodosius  the  Great  was  never 
sole  ruler ;  (2)  he  never  divided  the  Empire  between  his 


194  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

two  sons,  Arcadius  and  Honorius ;  (3)  there  was  never 
a  "Western  Empire"  —  at  least  before  Charlemagne's 
time ;  (4)  there  was  little  race  feeling  between  the  older 
inhabitants  of  the  Empire  and  the  Germans,  who 
freely  intermarried  even  in  the  higher  ranks  of  so- 
ciety ;  (5)  Alaric  was  not  the  reckless  leader  of  a  wild 
barbarian  race  which  swept  down  upon  the  capital  of 
the  world,  but  a  prudent  and  hesitating  politician 
addicted  to  prolonged  negotiations ;  (6)  Rome  was  not 
permanently  injured  by  his  brief  occupation  in  410; 
(7)  there  was  no  fall  of  the  Western  Empire  in  476, 
since  there  was  no  Western  Empire  to  fall,  and  nothing 
decisive  appears  to  have  happened  during  that  year, 
for  (8)  there  is  no  reason  to  regard  Romulus  Augus- 
tulus  as  having  been  properly  an  emperor  at  all,  or 
(9)  to  assume  that  Odovacar  ever  sent  the  imperial 
insignia  to  Constantinople. 


"THE  PRINCIPLES  OF   1789" 


Nearly  a  century  and  a  quarter  has  elapsed  since 
the  French  National  Assembly  issued  a  remarkable 
manifesto  in  which  it  discussed  the  nature,  extent,  and 
general  beneficence  of  the  Revolution.  After  only 
six  or  seven  months  of  work  the  Assembly  ventured  to 
claim  that  under  its  auspices  "an  old  and  corrupt 
nation  had  been  born  again  into  Uberty " ;  the  rights 
of  man,  misconceived  and  insulted  for  centuries,  had 
been  reestablished  for  all  mankind ;  privileges  without 
number  which  had  formed  the  public  law  of  France 
had  been  aboHshed  forever.  "Is  there  a  single  citi- 
zen worthy  of  the  name,"  it  exclaims,  "who  dares  to 
look  back,  —  who  would  once  more  rebuild  the  ruins 
which  surround  us  in  order  to  contemplate  again  the 
former  structure?" 

Yet  not  a  few  have  dared  to  look  back  with  regret, 
even  with  yearning,  upon  that  Ancien  Regime  whose 
ruins  the  Assembly  so  plentifully  sowed  with  the  salt 
of  its  contempt.  Indeed,  a  writer  of  our  own  day,  M. 
Charles  d'Hericault,  solemnized  the  one  hundredth 
anniversary  of  the  meeting  of  the  Estates  General  by 
rebuilding  the  ancient  edifice  with  idyllic  grace  and 

19s 


196  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

peopling  it  with  a  happy  and  virtuous  throng  who  had 
lived  together  in  blessed  concord  until  they  suffered 
themselves  to  be  alienated  from  God  and  their  king 
by  the  satanic  obsession  of  the  Revolution.  Accord- 
ing to  M.  d'Hericault,  the  Ancien  Regime  had  served 
to  develop  "in  the  highest  degree  in  each  social  class 
those  particular  qualities  required  in  order  that  all 
might  work  together  toward  the  organization  of  a 
perfect  society.  There  was,  first  of  all,  the  priest, 
wise,  venerable,  devoted ;  then  the  former  despot,  now 
transformed  into  a  courtly  and  respected  king;  and 
the  soldier,  now  a  polished  nobleman,  the  soul  of 
honor.  The  bourgeoisie  were  rich,  dignified,  and  well 
educated ;  lastly  the  people,  pious  and  gentle,  consoled 
themselves  for  the  lesser  troubles  of  life  by  amassing 
wealth,  by  singing  and  dancing,  while  they  met  their 
graver  misfortunes  by  the  thought  of  heaven." 

But  all  at  once,  with  stupefying  suddenness  and 
inhuman  violence,  this  happy.  Christian,  monarchical 
France  began  cursing  both  priests  and  kings;  she 
bowed  down  before  a  new  goddess  with  all  the  devotion 
which  she  had  formerly  lavished  upon  her  old  guides 
whom  she  would  now  exterminate  —  **Cette  idole 
nouvelle,  c'est  ce  qu'on  nomma  fort  justement  la 
R6volution."  1 

It  might  at  first  sight  seem  hardly  necessary  to 
reckon  seriously  with  the  opinions  of  a  hopelessly 
reactionary  royalist  who  received  his  earliest  impres- 
^  La  France  R&volutionnaire,  1789-1889  (Paris,  1889),  p.  i. 


"THE  PRINCIPLES  OF  1789"  I97 

sions  under  Charles  X.  But  M.  d'Hericault  is  only 
one  of  a  group  of  really  important  and  scholarly 
writers  who,  in  the  interests  of  reaction,  have  devoted 
themselves  to  picturing  the  horrors  and  anarchy  of 
the  Reign  of  Terror.  Moreover,  the  existence  of  this 
class  of  historians  can  alone  explain  the  attitude  of  the 
exalted  Republicans,  who  by  no  means  consent  to  pass 
over  the  utterances  of  their  inveterate  enemies  in  silent 
contempt. 

When  the  present  mimicipal  government  of  Paris 
subsidizes  historical  investigation,  it  is  influenced  by 
something  more  than  scientific  interest  or  even  ordi- 
nary civic  pride.  The  acts  of  the  Commune  during 
the  Revolution  have  been  collected  and  published  with 
a  view  of  establishing  "the  immortal  glory  of  Paris" 
in  forwarding  "the  emancipation  of  humanity." 
They  show,  it  is  claimed,  how  the  representatives  of 
Paris  founded  a  new  order  based  on  liberty  and  equal- 
ity, "opposing  virtue,  patriotism,  and  self-abnegation 
to  the  treason,  perfidy,  and  calumny  which  the  selfish- 
ness of  the  aristocrats  never  ceased  to  foment  against 
those  noble  citizens  of  whom  they  might  make  martyrs, 
but  never  renegades."  ^  When  one  calmly  considers 
the  role  of  the  Paris  Commune  in  the  establishing  of 
the  first  French  republic,  such  sentiments  appear  quite 
as  absurdly  apologetic  as  M.  d'Hericault's  picture  of 
the  felicity  of  the  Ancien  Regime. 

^  Actes  de  la  Commune  de  Paris,  edited  for  the  city  by  Lacroix,  I, 
p.  i  (1894). 


198  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

In  short,  Frenchmen  still  either  love  or  hate  the  Revo- 
lution as  did  their  forefathers  in  1 790.  A  French  writer 
has  very  recently  declared  that  "the  idea  of  treating 
the  Revolution  as  an  event  analogous  to  other  events, 
without  either  curses  or  apologies,  has  as  yet  never 
occurred  to  any  one."  ^  This  is  certainly  unfair,  but 
it  is  far  nearer  the  truth  than  Aulard's  claim  that  he 
and  his  band  treat  the  history  of  the  Revolution  in  the 
same  spirit  in  which  they  might  deal  with  that  of 
Greece  or  Rome.  It  will  be  a  long  time  before  French- 
men will  speak  of  Danton,  Anacharsis  Cloots,  Lafay- 
ette, and  DesmouUns  in  the  same  disengaged  spirit  in 
which  they  might  of  Cleon,  Brasidas,  Nicias,  and  Aris- 
tophanes. 

Partisan  enthusiasm  continues  to  be  perpetuated  in 
many  important  works  and  must  stiU  be  reckoned  with 
as  it  had  to  be  reckoned  with  a  hundred  years  ago.  In 
this  respect  the  Revolution  bears  out  the  observation 
of  Tocqueville  that,  although  political  in  its  nature,  it 
proceeded  in  the  manner  of  a  religious  revolution,  for 
it  stirred  up  animosities  which  in  their  inveterate  bit- 
terness rank  with  the  hateful  emotions  that  have  ac- 

*  T.  Cerfberr,  Essai  sur  le  Mouvement  Social  et  Intellectuel  en  France 
depuis  I78g{  Paris,  1902),  p  1 13.  Aulard  sadly  comments  on  Cerfberr's 
harsh  judgment:  "C'est  ^trangement  m^connaitre  tout  ce  que  mes 
amis  et  moi,  depuis  bientdt  vingt  ans,  avons  €crit  profess6,  sans  6clat 
et  sans  talent,  je  le  veux  bien,  mais  en  proclamant  trfis  haut  et  en  pour- 
suivant  sans  reliche  le  dessein  d'^tudier  I'histoire  de  la  Revolution 
'sans  anathfeme  comme  sans  apologie.'"  —  La  Revolution  Franqaisef 
Vol.  XLH,  p.  475- 


"THE  PRINCIPLES  OF  1789 »»  I99 

companied  religious  changes.  The  explanation  of  this 
perpetual  partisanship  is  to  be  sought  partly  in  the 
French  temperament,  but  chiefly  in  the  fact  that 
the  Revolution  did  not  succeed  in  settling  some  of  the 
most  important  questions  that  it  raised,  notably  the 
nature  of  the  central  government  and  the  relations 
between  Church  and  State.  Then,  the  successive 
constitutional  revolutions,  although  by  no  means  so 
fundamental  as  commonly  supposed,  have  served  to 
raise  the  spirits  of  each  party  in  turn  and  so  to  per- 
petuate hopes  in  the  breasts  of  the  most  radical  as 
well  as  the  most  conservative.  Consequently  the 
first  Revolution  forms  the  background  of  every 
debate  upon  current  issues,  and  the  Principles  of 
1789  are  appealed  to  with  interpretations  varying 
with  the  taste,  purposes,  and  convictions  of  each  par- 
ticular orator  who  invokes  them. 

The  French  Revolution  is  perhaps  the  most  diffi- 
cult theme  that  a  historian  can  select.  One  who  at- 
tempts to  treat  it,  encounters  every  obstacle  and  pitfall 
that  besets  the  path  of  those  that  endeavor  to  make 
the  present  understand  the  past.  There  is  much  doubt 
as  to  where  the  Revolution  began,  and  as  to  when  it 
ceased,  if  it  has  yet  come  to  an  end.  There  is  a  bewil- 
dering mass  of  sources  in  regard  to  certain  matters, 
and  few  or  no  sources  for  others.  Every  form  of 
violent  partisanship  —  religious,  political,  social, 
and  philosophical  —  must  constantly  be  considered. 
Every  one  took  a  hand  —  kings,  foreign  and  domestic, 


200  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

courtiers,  national  assemblies  and  their  innumerable 
committees,  local  revolutionary  bodies,  communes, 
deputies  on  mission,  emigres,  priests  juring  and  non- 
juring,  clubs,  orators,  newspaper  editors,  pamphlet- 
eers —  and  to  each  of  these  active  forces  must  be 
assigned  its  proper  influence  on  the  course  of  affairs. 
Finally,  on  no  occasion  in  recorded  history  were  so 
many  changes  efifected  or  suggested,  in  so  many  fields 
of  human  interest,  in  so  short  a  time,  as  in  France 
during  the  ten  or  fifteen  years  following  the  convening 
of  the  Estates  General  in  1789.  The  most  radical 
political,  social,  economic,  religious,  and  educational 
reforms  were  associated  with  imprecedented  popular 
excitement  and  disorder,  with  foreign  and  civil  war, 
national  defense,  aggression  and  diplomacy,  to  such  a 
degree  as  to  render  any  coherent  treatment  of  the 
whole  range  of  events  practically  impossible.  As 
Carlyle  said  long  ago,  the  words  "French  Revolution" 
may  "have  as  many  meanings  as  there  are  speakers  of 
them."  To  him  it  meant  "the  open,  violent  rebellion 
and  victory  of  disimprisoned  anarchy  against  cor- 
rupt, worn-out  authority ;  how  anarchy  breaks  prison, 
bursts  up  from  the  infinite  deep,  and  rages  uncontrol- 
lable, immeasurable,  enveloping  a  world  in  phasis 
after  phasis  of  fever-frenzy."  By  Taine  the  Revolu- 
tion is  likened  to  the  disorders  produced  in  a  gentle- 
man "rather  weak  in  constitution  but  apparently 
sound  and  of  peaceful  habits,  who  drinks  eagerly  of  a 
new  liquor,  falls  suddenly  to  the  ground,  foaming  at 


"THE  PRINCIPLES  OF   1789"  201 

the  mouth,  delirious  and  convulsed."  Neither  Carlyle 
nor  Taine  took  his  imagery  so  seriously  as  to  miss  some 
of  the  deeper  significance  of  the  Revolution;  but 
weaker  heads  than  theirs  have  been  completely  bewil- 
dered by  the  loud  talk  and  disorder  of  the  period,  which 
they  have  mistaken  for  the  Revolution  itself.  One  of 
the  most  striking  achievements  of  the  last  quarter  of 
a  century  is  the  relegation  of  the  Reign  of  Terror  to  its 
proper  place.  The  English-reading  pubhc  has  Pro- 
fessor Morse  Stephens  in  especial  to  thank  for  ex- 
plaining and  reducing  to  its  proper  proportions  the 
"disimprisoned  anarchy,"  which  indeed  seems  almost 
trivial  when  compared  with  the  magnificent  turmoil 
in  Russia  in  recent  years. 

The  merely  personal  has  always  been  conspicuous 
in  the  histories  of  the  Revolution.  Marie  Antoinette, 
the  Princess  de  Lamballe,  Marat,  Charlotte  Corday, 
Desmoulins,  Danton,  Saint-Just,  the  poor  little 
dauphin  —  these  have  been  dear  to  the  hearts  of 
readers  whose  interest  was  much  more  readily  enlisted 
in  the  storming  of  the  Bastille  or  the  September 
massacres  than  in  the  origin  of  France's  first  constitu- 
tion and  the  principles  underlying  it. 

It  is  high  time  that  we  had  a  general  account  of 
the  Revolution  regarded  simply  and  solely  in  its  most 
fundamental  aspects  as  a  reformation,  social,  political, 
and  economic.  This  is  what  Chassin  evidently  had 
in  mind  when  he  began  his  never  completed  Genius 
of  the  Revolution.    He  dreamed  of  an  histoire  post- 


202  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

the,  in  which  the  personal,  anecdotal,  transient,  and 
fantastic  should  give  way  to  the  permanent  achieve- 
ments of  the  time.^  By  the  term  "Revolution" 
Chassin  understood  not  the  upbubbling  of  "disim- 
prisoned anarchy,"  but  quite  prosaically  the  way  in 
which  the  reformers  transformed  their  ideas  into  acts: 
how  they  substituted  for  a  polity  based  upon  privilege, 
the  regime  of  equality ;  for  despotism,  a  free  state ;  for 
divine  right,  the  sovereignty  of  the  people ;  for  favor, 
justice.  Assuredly,  as  Chassin  ventured  to  think, 
"cette  histoire  ne  gagnerait-elle  pas  en  certitude  ce  qu' 
au  premier  aspect  elle  semblerait  perdre  en  interet." 
But  why  offer  apologies  ?  We  long  to  know  just 
what  was  actually  accomplished.  In  order  to  learn, 
however,  what  was  done  and  so  appreciate  properly  the 
place  of  the  Revolution  among  the  great  transforma- 
tions of  history,  it  will  be  necessary  to  bring  the  his- 
tory of  France  from  1789  to  1800  into  organic  relation 
not  only  with  the  Ancien  Regime,  but  with  the  develop- 
ments throughout  western  Europe  of  the  half  century 
immediately  preceding  the  assembling  of  the  Estates 
General.  The  older  writers  tended  to  give  prefer- 
ence, in  their  study  of  the  Ancien  Regime,  to  the  spec- 
tacular abuses  and  the  eccentricities  of  speculation, 
which  may  indeed  serve  to  explain  the  attitude  of 
some  of  the  more  fantastic  terrorists,  but  which  will 
never  account  for  the  seemingly  abrupt  and  permanent 

^  Le  GSnie  de  la  R&Boluiion  (1864-1865),  introduction.    Only  the 
first  two  volumes,  on  the  cahiers  of  1789,  ever  appeared. 


"THE  PRINCIPLES  OF  1789"  203 

betterment.  This  must  remain  a  mystery  to  those 
who  have  not  traced  the  more  or  less  abortive  reforms 
and  the  irresistible  demands  for  improvement  which 
lie  back  of  the  Principles  of  lySg.  The  Revolution 
will  some  day  be  recognized  as  the  most  decisive  and 
general  readjustment  to  meet  new  and  altered  condi- 
tions of  which  we  have  any  record.  To  tell  the  story 
of  this  rebirth,  not"  only  in  France  but  in  western 
Europe,  with  scrupulous  attention  to  the  process  of 
gestation,  is  an  aspiration  which,  it  is  to  be  hoped,  will 
dominate  those  who  deal  with  this  subject  in  the  future. 

So  few  writers  have  as  yet  set  before  themselves 
quite  clearly  the  problem  of  discovering  and  explain- 
ing the  really  great  and  permanent  results  of  the 
Revolution,  that  the  pubUc  may  be  forgiven  for 
scarcely  suspecting  that  there  have  been  such  results. 
One  exception  must  certainly  be  made.  M.  Aulard 
undertakes  a  definite  task  in  his  Political  History  oj 
the  French  Revolution  and  has  chosen  what  he  regards  as 
the  two  most  essential  principles  of  the  movement  — 
equality  of  rights  and  popular  sovereignty  —  and  has 
devoted  his  unswerving  attention  and  vast  knowl- 
edge to  narrating  the  vicissitudes  which  these  two 
principles  underwent  from  1789  to  1804.  As  one  reads 
his  book  it  seems  as  if  one  had  escaped  from  wild 
delirium  into  a  realm  of  tolerably  coherent  and  intel- 
ligible thought  and  purpose. 

Underlying  the  dramatic  episodes  of  the  Revolu- 
tion, and  obscured  by  them,  is  a  story  of  fundamental 


204  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

social  and  political  reform  which  not  only  serves  to 
explain  the  history  of  France  during  the  nineteenth 
century,  but  casts  much  light  as  well  upon  the  progress 
of  liberal  institutions  in  Europe  at  large.  If  we  im- 
agine some  sober-minded  student  of  the  future  look- 
ing back  five  hundred  years  hence  upon  the  French 
Revolution,  it  may  well  be  that  to  him  its  romantic 
episodes  will  so  far  have  sunk  into  the  background 
that  its  real  contributions  to  European  institutions 
will  be  apparent.  Among  the  achievements  to  which 
our  remote  observer  will  assign  an  important  placC 
will  be  what  are  known  in  France  as  "the  Principles 
of  1789." 

Ever  since  Burke  denounced  the  first  French  National 
Assembly  and  the  "clumsy  subtility  of  their  political 
metaphysics,"  which,  like  .^Eolus's  winds,  threatened 
to  "sweep  the  earth  with  their  hurricane,"  there  has 
been  a  marked  tendency  upon  the  part  of  English 
and  German  historians  to  condemn  the  Declaration 
of  the  Rights  of  Man  as  an  instance  of  Gallic  light- 
headedness. Sybel  thinks  that  the  terrible  crisis 
which  confronted  France  in  the  following  years  may 
clearly  be  seen  in  its  provisions,  and  almost  all  writers 
agree  that  much  valuable  time  that  should  have  been 
devoted  to  urgent  concrete  reforms  was  wasted  in 
empty  scholastic  disputation.  Frenchmen  have  in 
some  cases  condemned  the  Declaration  from  the  stand- 
point of  political  expediency  as  harshly  as  foreign 
critics.    On  the  other  hand,  the  Declaration  not  only 


"THE  PRINCIPLES  OF  1789"  205 

aroused  general  enthusiasm  when  first  published, 
but  appeared  over  and  over  again,  in  a  modified  form, 
in  succeeding  French  constitutions  down  to  1848,  and 
has  been  the  model  for  similar  declarations  in  many  of 
the  constitutions  of  the  other  continental  states. 

In  the  attempts  to  explain  the  origin  and  discover 
the  archetypes  of  the  Declaration  of  Rights  there 
have  been  two  main  tendencies :  the  one,  to  lay  the 
responsibility  at  the  door  of  Rousseau;  the  other, 
to  recall  precedents  in  the  United  States,  to  which 
reference  is  often  made,  though  most  vaguely,  in  the 
debates  of  the  National  Assembly.  Sybel  believes 
that  our  Declaration  of  Independence  suggested  the 
idea  to  the  French.  Hausser  and  Stephens  discover 
a  model  in  a  mythical  declaration  of  rights  which, 
they  assmne,  is  prefixed  to  our  federal  constitution.^ 

The  purpose  of  the  present  paper  is  to  show  how 
gradually  the  idea  of  a  constitution  developed  in 
France,  and  how  natural  it  was  to  preface  her  first 
written  constitution  by  a  brief  statement  of  the  general 
principles  upon  which  it  was  founded.  It  is  assuredly 
high  time  that  we  should  cease  to  study  the  conduct 
of  France's  first  modem  legislative  body  with  the 

*  These  distinguished  historians  differ  as  to  the  nature  of  our  fed- 
eral bill  of  rights.  Hausser  asserts  that  it  is  expressed  in  knappen 
laconischen  Worten  (Gesch.  d.  Fr.  Rev.,  p.  169),  while,  according  to 
Professor  H.  Morse  Stephens,  all  the  deputies  who  admired  the  Ameri- 
can constitution  said  "that  no  respectable  constitution  could  pos- 
sibly be  drawn  up  without  an  elaborate  [ !  ]  declaration  prefixed  to 
it." — Hist,  of  the  Fr.  Rev.,  American  edition,  I,  p.  165. 


206  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

main  aim  of  finding  explanations  for  the  Reign  of 
Terror.  Let  us  endeavor,  instead,  to  see  their  task 
as  it  appeared  to  the  deputies  and  to  their  constit- 
uents. In  order  to  do  this  we  must  review  the  cir- 
cumstances under  which  the  National  Assembly 
first  announced  its  intention  of  drawing  up  a  consti- 
tution. 

n 

Every  one  knows  that  early  in  May  of  1789  the 
ancient  feudal  assembly  of  three  orders  known  as  the 
Estates  General  assembled  in  Versailles  after  an  inter- 
val of  a  hundred  and  seventy-five  years.  In  spite 
of  the  studiously  antiquated  dress  prescribed  for  its 
members,  the  body  was  found  to  have  undergone  a 
very  significant  change  since  last  it  met.  No  royal 
edict  could  recreate  the  spirit  of  earHer  centuries. 
The  inevitable  metamorphosis  into  a  modern  repre- 
sentative assembly  took  place  during  the  succeeding 
weeks,  notwithstanding  the  opposition  of  the  conserv- 
ative elements. 

The  intriguing  courtiers  about  the  king  were  quick 
to  realize  this  dangerous  tendency  and  induced 
Louis  XVI  to  suspend  the  sessions  of  the  three  orders 
on  the  excuse  that  he  proposed  to  hold  a  royal  session 
on  June  22,  and  that  it  was  necessary  to  set  the  car- 
penters to  work  to  prepare  the  hall  for  this  solemn 
occasion. 

On  finding  the  usual  place  of  assembly  occupied  by  the 


"THE  PRINCIPLES  OF  1789"  207 

workmen,  the  representatives  of  the  third  estate 
gathered  in  the  Tennis  Court  of  Versailles  and  adopted 
the  following  resolution :  — 

The  National  Assembly,  regarding  itself  as  called  upon  to 
establish  the  constitution  of  the  kingdom,  effect  a  regeneration 
of  the  state  {Vordre  public)  and  maintain  the  true  principles  of 
monarchy,  may  not  be  prevented  from  continuing  its  delibera- 
tions in  whatever  place  it  may  be  forced  to  take  up  its  sittings. 
Maintaining  further,  that  wherever  its  members  are  assembled, 
there  is  the  National  Assembly,  the  assembly  decrees  that  all  its 
members  shall  immediately  take  a  solemn  oath  never  to  separate, 
and  to  come  together  wherever  circumstances  may  dictate,  until 
the  constitution  of  the  kingdom  shall  be  estabUshed  and  placed 
upon  a  firm  foundation. 

The  importance  of  this  resolution  lies  in  the  fact 
that  it  was  the  first  distinct  and  formal  assertion 
of  the  assembly's  mission. 

The  usual  accounts  of  the  French  Revolution  are 
apt  to  give  the  impression  that  this  famous  oath  was 
the  unpremeditated  outcome  of  an  invasion  of  car- 
penters,—  of  "hammering,  sawing,  and  operative 
screeching, "  as  Carlyle  says ;  but  as  a  matter  of  fact 
the  oath  of  June  20  constituted  in  reality  only  a  slight, 
although  politically  important,  advance  beyond  the 
state  of  affairs  before  the  deputies  found  themselves 
excluded  from  their  meeting  place. 

A  resolution  had  been  passed  three  days  before 
Qune  17)  by  which  the  deputies  of  the  third  estate 
had  assumed  the  title  of  "National  Assembly." 
The  deputies  had,  moreover,  taken  an  oath  upon  this 


208  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

same  seventeenth  of  June  very  like  the  Tennis  Court 
oath  itself :  ''We  swear  and  pledge  ourselves  to  fulfill 
with  zeal  and  fidelity  the  duties  which  devolve  upon 
us."  "This  oath,"  we  are  told,  "taken  by  six  hun- 
dred members,  surrounded  by  four  thousand  specta- 
tors (the  public  having  gathered  in  crowds  at  this 
session),  excited  the  greatest  emotion,  and  constituted 
a  most  imposing  spectacle."  Apparently  all  that  was 
novel  in  the  Tennis  Court  oath  is  the  clear  announce- 
ment that  the  establishment  of  a  constitution  is  the 
essential  task  of  the  assembly. 

The  unanimous  recognition  on  the  part  of  the  depu- 
ties that  the  true  object  of  the  assembly  was  the 
drafting  of  a  constitution  is  quite  sufficient  to  prove 
that  the  public  mind  was  ripe  for  this  declaration. 
By  what  steps  had  the  French  nation  attained  to  a 
clear  conviction  that  the  salvation  of  the  country 
depended  upon  the  distinct  formulation  of  the  prin- 
ciples of  government  —  a  conviction  which  received 
its  first  official  announcement  in  the  Tennis  Court 
oath? 

The  motives  advanced  by  the  king  and  his  ministers 
for  convoking  the  Estates  General  had  been  but 
vaguely  conceived,  and  therefore  but  vaguely  indicated, 
in  the  Letter  of  Summons,  of  January  24,  1789.  "We 
have,"  the  document  relates,  "need  of  the  counsel 
of  our  faithful  subjects  to  aid  us  in  overcoming  all  the 
difficulties  in  which  we  are  involved  respecting  the 
state  of  our  finances,  and  to  estabUsh  according  to 


"THE  PRINCIPLES  OF   1789"  209 

our  wishes  a  constant  and  invariable  order  in  the 
various  parts  of  the  government  which  affect  the  hap- 
piness of  our  subjects  and  the  prosperity  of  our  king- 
dom." The  phrase  "fixed  and  constant  order  in  all 
parts  of  the  administration"  occurs  three  times  in 
this  brief  document  as  one  of  the  great  objects 
which  the  Estates  General,  in  conjunction  with  the 
king,  are  expected  to"  accomplish.  The  report  which 
Necker,  then  in  charge  of  the  finances,  made  to  the 
king,  a  month  previous  to  the  actual  summoning  of 
the  estates,  although  claiming  to  reflect  the  inmost 
purposes  of  the  monarch,  really  does  little  to  define 
the  vague  terms  used  in  the  letter  of  convocation 
itself.  Necker  says  nothing  of  a  constitution,  but 
seems  to  take  for  granted  that  the  Estates  General 
are  to  be  regularly  and  periodically  convened  in  the 
future,  and  that  the  worst  abuses  are  to  be  done  away 
with  and  the  administration  improved.  No  further 
program  was  furnished  by  the  government  until  the 
king  submitted  an  elaborate  and  interesting  plan 
of  reform  in  thirty-five  articles  at  the  royal  session, 
three  days  after  the  Tennis  Court  oath. 

The  ideas  of  reform  vaguely  advanced  by  the  govern- 
ment had  taken  a  much  more  definite  shape,  however, 
in  the  minds  of  the  leading  spirits  in  the  nation  at 
large,  and  had  developed  into  the  matured  concep- 
tion of  a  constitution  some  time  before  the  assembling 
of  the  Estates  General.  A  remarkable  forecast  of 
the  ideas  which  later  became  the  basis  of  constitu- 


2IO  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

tional  revolution  is  to  be  found  in  the  "protests "  of  the 
parlements  issued  from  time  to  time  during  the  eight- 
eenth century.  These  superior  courts  of  France  had 
formulated  the  theory  of  a  constitution  long  before 
the  Revolution,  and  had,  moreover,  taken  great  pains 
to  familiarize  the  public  with  the  idea. 

Considering  the  inherently  close  connection  between 
the  legislative  and  the  judicial  functions  of  govern- 
ment, it  is  not  strange  that  a  proud  and  self-conscious 
body  like  the  parlement  of  Paris  should  have  been 
inclined  to  define  its  duties  broadly  and  extend  its 
influence  so  as  to  exercise  a  certain  control  over  the 
formation  of  the  law.  This  tendency  was  rendered 
almost  inevitable  by  a  custom  which  had  long  existed 
of  permitting  the  courts  to  protest  against,  and  demand 
a  reconsideration  of,  kingly  edicts  when  presented  to 
them  for  registration.  This  anomalous  right  of  par- 
ticipation in  legislation  was  stoutly  defended  by  the 
parlements,  the  arguments  advanced  being  based  not 
only  upon  precedent,  but  upon  justice  and  expediency 
as  well.  The  attempts  of  the  king  and  his  ministers 
to  force  the  courts  to  register  edicts  against  their  will 
produced  serious  crises.  On  these  occasions  the 
despotic  character  of  the  French  monarchy  and  the 
problem  of  the  exact  nature  of  the  legislative  act  were 
brought  prominently  before  the  nation. 

In  order  to  support  their  contingent  opposition  to 
the  wishes  of  the  king,  whom  they  recognized  freely 
enough  as  the  supreme  lawgiver,  the  courts  put  for- 


"THE  PRINCIPLES  OF  1789*'  211 

ward  the  theory  of  a  constitution.  They  assume  the 
guardianship  of  the  "fundamental  laws"  of  the  mon- 
archy. It  devolves  upon  them,  they  claim,  to  main- 
tain the  constitution  of  the  kingdom  and  to  see  that 
no  fundamental  maxims  are  violated.  This  consti- 
tution was  perhaps  ill-defined,  and  was  comprised 
in  no  accepted  written  code ;  nevertheless,  the  courts 
very  properly  pointed  out  that  it  was  only  by  contin- 
uing to  observe  certain  venerable  usages  that  France 
could  be  said  to  enjoy  a  regular  legal  government  at 
all.  As  they  once  bluntly  told  Louis  XV:  "Adula- 
tion itself  would  not  dare  to  assert  that  in  every  case 
anything  that  the  king  wills  becomes  forthwith  a  law 
of  the  monarchy."  ^  The  parlements  appear  to  have 
been  conscious,  however,  that  their  claims  rested  at 
best  upon  a  somewhat  precarious  foundation.  They 
never  venture  to  give  a  complete  or  even  extended 
enumeration  of  the  "fundamental  laws"  of  the  mon- 
archy. For  the  vagueness  of  their  pretensions  they 
seek  to  compensate  by  solemn  reiteration.^ 

Notwithstanding  the  obvious  want  of  definiteness 
in  the  theories  of  the  parlements,  there  is  much  in  the 
widely  circulated  protests,  beginning  with  that  of 
May,  1716,  which  could  not  but  leave  a  deep  impres- 
sion upon  a  public  that  was  becoming  more  and  more 

'  Protest  of  the  Parlement  of  Brittany,  July,  1771. 

*  "Le  Parlement  sent  bien  la  fragility  des  droits  qu'il  reclame  et  il 
d£guise  la  faiblesse  de  ses  pretentions  sous  des  affirmations  vagues  qu'il 
d6veloppe  dans  un  langage  solennel."  Flammermont,  Remontrances 
du  Parlement  de  Paris  au  XVIIIe  Sikle,  I,  p.  xxxi. 


212  THE   NEW  HISTORY 

conscious  of  the  abuses  and  dangers  of  absolutism. 
The  nature  of  successive  conflicts  between  the  superior 
courts  and  the  king's  ministers,  important  as  they 
were  in  cultivating  a  spirit  of  general  discontent,  can- 
not be  considered  here.  We  must  confine  ourselves 
to  the  stimulus  given  by  the  parlements  to  the  grow- 
ing demands  in  the  eighteenth  century  for  a  limita- 
tion of  the  king's  powers. 

The  following  statement  of  the  parlements^  case, 
made  some  seventy  years  before  the  Tennis  Court 
oath,  contains  a  summary  of  the  claims  which  are 
separately  developed  at  greater  length  in  the  various 
manifestoes  of  those  bodies :  — 

While  we  recognize,  Sire,  that  you  alone  are  lord  and  master 
and  the  sole  lawgiver,  and  that  there  are  laws  which  varying 
times,  the  needs  of  your  people,  the  maintenance  of  order,  and 
the  administration  of  your  kingdom  may  oblige  you  to  change, 
substituting  new  ones  according  to  the  forms  always  observed 
in  this  state,  we  nevertheless  believe  it  to  be  our  duty  to  call 
to  your  attention  the  existence  of  laws  as  old  as  the  monarchy, 
which  are  permanent  and  invariable,  the  guardianship  of  which 
was  committed  to  you  along  with  the  crown  itself.  ...  It  is  by 
reason  of  the  permanence  of  such  laws  that  we  have  you  as  lord 
and  master.  It  is  this  permanence  which  leads  us  to  hope  that 
the  crown,  having  rested  upon  your  head  during  a  long,  just, 
and  glorious  reign,  will  pass  to  j^our  posterity  for  all  time  to 
come. 

In  recent  times  it  has  been  clearly  shown  how  much  France 
owes  to  the  maintenance  of  these  original  laws  of  the  state,  and 
how  important  it  is  in  the  service  of  your  Majesty  that  your 
parlement,  which  is  responsible  to  you  and  to  the  nation  for  their 


"THE  PRINCIPLES   OF   1789"  213 

exact  observation,  shoiild  assiduously  guard  against  any  attack 
upon  them.' 

Even  Louis  XIV,  the  parlement  claims,  had  regarded 
that  body  as  "  the  real  guardian  of  the  fundamental 
laws  of  the  kingdom,  and  even  the  most  absolute  of 
the  kings  had  accepted  the  registration  by  the  parle- 
ment as  a  necessary-  condition  for  the  enactment  of 
a  law."  2 

The  superior  tribunals,  especially  the  parlement  of 
Paris,  are  thus  placed  upon  the  same  footing  as  the 
monarch  himself.  They  both  exist  in  virtue  of  the 
same  fundamental  or  constitutional  laws.  Thus, 
**la  constitution  la  plus  essentielle  et  la  plus  sacree 
de  la  monarchie,"^  as  conceived  by  the  magistrates, 
provided  not  only  for  a  king  with  "fortunate  inabili- 
ties,"^ but  for  tribunals  which  had  a  right  to  cooper- 
ate in  legislation.^    Both  owed  their  existence  to  the 

*  Itiratives  Remontrances  sur  la  Refonte  des  Monnaies,  July  26, 1718. 
Flammermont's  collection,  I,  pp.  88  ff.,  especially  pp.  94,  95. 

*  Ibid.,  pp.  95,  96. 

*  Remontrance  of  June  18,  1763,  p.  16. 

*  "Bienheureuse  impuissance,"  a  constantly  recurring  quotation 
from  the  Droits  de  la  Reine  sur  divers  Etats  de  la  Monarchic  de  I'Espagne- 
supposed  to  have  been  inspired  by  Louis  XIV. 

'  "Que  toute  administration  dans  I'^tat  est  fond6e  sur  des  Loix,  et 
qu'il  n'en  est  aucune  sans  un  enregistrement  libre,  pr6c6d6  de  v6rifica, 
tion  et  d'examen,  que  cette  verification  est  n6cessaire  pour  donner  k 
toutes  les  Loix  ce  caract^re  d'authenticit6,  auquel  les  peuples  recon- 
noissent  Tautorit^  qui  doit  les  conduire,"  etc.  Extrait  des  registres  du 
Parlement,  January  2,  1760,  p.  13.  See  also  Remontrance  of  Jime  18, 
J  763,  passim. 


214  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

same  imprescriptible  law  by  which  the  kings  themselves 
were  kings.^ 

The  so-called  Grandes  Remontrances  of  1753  dis- 
cuss at  length  the  relation  of  the  will  of  the  sover- 
eign to  the  law  of  the  land.  The  subjection  of  the 
kingly  will  to  law  is  clearly  set  forth,  and  the  theory 
is  supported  by  a  variety  of  somewhat  startling  quo- 
tations culled  from  the  political  literature  of  Louis 
XIV's  reign,^  This  remonstrance  of  1753,  dealing 
with  the  refusal  of  the  sacraments,  closes  the  long 
struggle  growing  out  of  the  bull  Unigenitus.  The 
succeeding  conflicts  between  parlements  and  ministry 
turn  on  other  matters.  The  popularity-loving  magis- 
trates, susceptible  to  the  spirit  of  the  times,  learn  to 

*  The  Parlement  asserts,  in  a  protest  of  June  18,  1763 :  "Que  de 
m6me  que  le  souverain  est  I'auteur  et  le  protecteur  des  Loix,  de  meme 
les  Loix  sont  la  base  et  les  garants  de  I'autorite  du  Souverain ;  et  que 
toute  atteinte  portee  aux  Loix  retombe  plus  ou  moins  directement  sur 
le  Souverain  lui-m6me.  Que  m6connoitre  I'existence  ou  la  force  irr6- 
fragable  des  Loix  immuables  par  leur  nature,  constitutives  de  I'^conomie 
de  r6tat,  ce  seroit  6branler  la  solidity  du  Tr6ne  meme.  Que  suivant 
les  expressions  du  Premier  Pr6sident  de  son  Parlement,  parlant  k  I'un 
des  augustes  Pr6d6cesseurs  dudit  Seigneur  Roi, '  les  Loix  de  l'6tat  et  du 
Royaume  ne  peuvent  fitres  viol6es  sans  r6voquer  en  dout  la  Puissance 
mfime  et  la  Souverainet€  dudit  Seigneur  Roi.  Que  nous  avons  deux 
sortes  de  loix ;  les  unes  sont  les  Ordonnances  des  Rois,  qui  se  peuvent 
changer  selon  la  diversity  des  temps  et  des  affaires ;  les  autres  sont  les 
Ordonnances  du  Royaume,  qui  sont  inviolables,  et  par  lesquelles  ledit 
Seigneur  Roi  est  mont6  au  Tr6ne  royal,  et  cette  Couronne  a  ^t6  con- 
serve par  ses  pr6d6cesseurs  jusqu'll  lui.'"  This  last  quotation  the 
court  derived  from  a  speech  made  by  Harlai  before  the  king,  June  15, 
1586. 

'  Flammermont,  I,  pp.  521  £f. 


"THE  PRINCIPLES  OF  1789"  215 

give  a  democratic  or,  at  least,  a  popular,  tone  to  their 
declarations.  The  terms  "nation,"  "people,"  and 
citoyen  occur  more  and  more  frequently  in  the  expostu- 
lations with  the  king.  We  can  easily  perceive  the 
growing  antagonism  of  the  nation  towards  an  unlimited 
or  ill-defined  royal  power.  The  clearest  and  most  ma- 
ture statement  of  the  theory  of  a  constitution  which 
I  have  found  occurs  in  an  obscure  remonstrance  ad- 
dressed to  the  king  by  the  parlement  of  Brittany, 
dated  July,  1771 :  — 

There  is  an  essential  difference  between  the  transitory  regu- 
lations which  vary  with  the  times,  and  the  fundamental  laws 
upon  which  the  constitution  of  the  monarchy  rests.  In  respect 
to  the  former  [that  is,  the  transitory  regulations],  it  is  the  duty 
of  the  courts  to  influence  and  enlighten  the  ruling  power,  al- 
though their  opinions  must,  in  the  last  instance,  yield  to  the 
decisions  of  your  wisdom,  since  it  appertains  to  you  alone  to 
regulate  everything  relating  to  the  administration.  To  admin- 
bter  the  state  is  not,  however,  to  change  its  constitution.  .  .  . 
It  is,  therefore,  most  indispensable  to  distinguish  and  to  except 
the  cases  where  the  right  of  expostulation  suffices  to  enlighten 
the  ruling  power  in  an  administration  which,  in  spite  of  its  wide 
scope,  still  has  its  limits,  and  those  cases  where  the  happy  in- 
ability [of  the  monarch]  to  overstep  the  bounds  established  by 
the  constitution  implies  the  power  necessary  legally  to  oppose 
what  an  arbitrary  will  cannot  and  may  not  do. 

While  this  is  obviously  an  ex  parte  argument  with  a 
view  to  justifying  the  pretensions  of  the  courts,  it  is 
a  remarkable  approximation  to  the  later  ideas  of  a 
constitution  as  distinguished  from  current  statutory 
legislation.    Not  only  was  the  word  "constitution" 


2l6  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

familiar  to  the  thoughtful  Frenchman  many  years 
before  the  Revolution,  but  the  idea  which  underlies 
the  modern  conception  of  a  constitutional  government 
was  ready  at  hand. 

That  the  superior  courts  represented  the  nation 
since  the  discontinuance  of  the  Estates  General  was 
perhaps  the  basis  of  the  claim  which  the  parlements 
ventured  to  make  upon  the  sympathy  of  the  pubHc.^ 
It  was  the  parlement  of  Paris  which,  on  July  i6,  1787, 
requested  that  the  Estates  General  be  again  convoked, 
"in  view  of  the  fact  that  the  Nation,  represented  by  the 
Estates  General,  alone  has  a  right  to  grant  the  king  the 
necessary  subsidies."  This  demand,  passed  by  a 
strange  coahtion  of  radicals  and  conservatives,  who 
held  opposite  views  of  the  meaning  of  their  action, 
was  the  beginning  of  the  end. 

Doubtless  our  own  early  state  constitutions  may 
have  served  to  clarify  the  ideas  of  some  of  their  more 
thoughtful  readers  in  France.  The  earliest  collection 
of  these,  published  in  1778,  was  prepared  for  French 
readers.  Another  edition  of  two  hundred  copies,  exacts 
et  corrects,  appears  to  have  been  dispatched  to  France 
somewhat    later,    by    order    of    Congress.^    Turgot, 

^  "Ce  peuple  avoit  autrefois  la  consolation  de  presenter  ses  dol6- 
ances  aux  Rois  vos  pr6d6cesseurs ;  mais  depuis  un  si^cle  et  un  demi  les 
6tats  n'ont  point  6t6  convoqu6s.  Jusqu'^  ce  jour  au  moins  la  reclama- 
tion des  Cours  suppl6oit  k  celle  des  6tats,  quoiqu'imparfaitement." 
Remontrances  de  la  Cour  des  Aides,  February  i8,  1771. 

*  Professor  James  Shotwell  has  called  my  attention  to  a  curious 
review  of  this  oflBcial  collection  in  Freron's  Annee  Litidraire,  VU,  p.  107 


"THE  PRINCIPLES  OF  1789"  217 

Mably,  Condorcet,  and  others  published  comments 
upon  our  institutions.  There  can,  I  think,  be  no 
doubt  that  the  hazy  allusions  which  we  find  in  the 
debates  of  the  National  Assembly  to  the  Declarations 
of  Rights  in  America  have  no  reference  to  our  federal 
constitution,^  nor,  ordinarily,  to  the  Declaration  of 
Independence,  but  to  the  elaborate  bills  of  rights  which 
precede  some  of  our  "early  state  constitutions,  notably 
those  of  Massachusetts  and  Virginia. 

The  experience  of  the  United  States  may  well  have 
added  somewhat  to  the  precision  and  vigor  of  an 
already  well-developed  movement  towards  constitu- 
tional reform ;  more  weight  than  this  cannot  safely 
be  ascribed  to  American  example.  It  is  in  the  condi- 
tions and  course  of  events  in  France,  not  in  foreign 
influence,  that  the  true  explanation  is  to  be  found 
of  the  demand  for  a  written  guaranty  of  their  rights 

(1783).  The  aim  of  Congress  "a  6t6,  sans  doute,  de  satisfaire  la  juste 
curiosit6  de  I'Europe,  en  lui  faisant  connaltxe  sous  quel  caractfere  et 
avec  quels  titres  les  Etats-Unis  vent  paraltre  sur  la  sctee  du  monde. 
Nous  ne  doutons  pas  que  cela  ne  soit  accueilli  avec  empressement, 
surtout  par  la  France,  qui  a  si  bien  aid6  TAmfirique  k  enfanter  la  R6- 
publique  nouvelle.  Ce  n'est  pas  que  nous  adoptons  toutes  les  id6es ; 
nous  sommes  si  libres  sous  des  monarques  chfiris,  que  dans  le  temps 
mfeme  oil  nous  f^licitons  nos  amis  de  jouer  d'une  liberty  qui  est  plus 
de  leur  goQt,  nous  sommes  trSs  dloign^s  de  leur  porter  la  moindre 
envie."  While  the  Declaration  of  Independence  is  pronounced  the 
most  important  document,  the  constitution  of  Massachusetts  is  re- 
viewed at  length. 

*  The  first  ten  amendments  of  our  federal  constitution,  which  form 
a  sort  of  bill  of  rights,  were  not  proposed  in  Congress  imtil  a  month 
after  the  final  formulation  of  the  Declaration  of  the  Rights  of  Man. 


2l8  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

made  by  all  classes  of  Frenchmen  in  1 788-1 789.  In 
the  period  of  excitement  accompan3dng  the  attempt 
of  a  hampered  and  incensed  ministry  to  destroy  the 
old  tribunals  in  May,  1788,  the  Parlement  of  Paris 
ventured  to  formulate  the  principles  of  the  constitu- 
tion in  more  detail  than  ever  before.  Among  the 
fimdamental  laws  were  "the  right  of  the  nation 
freely  to  grant  subsidies  through  the  Estates  General" 
and  the  right  of  every  citizen  never  to  be  arrested 
except  to  be  sent  immediately  before  competent  judges. 
These  propositions  suggest  two  of  the  "rights"  of 
man  and  the  citizen  as  later  sanctioned  by  the  As- 
sembly. With  these  propositions  were  associated  a 
number  of  others  which  aimed  to  establish  the  consti- 
tutional inability  of  the  king  and  his  ministers  to 
abolish  the  parlements,  whose  prerogative  it  was  "to 
examine  in  each  province  the  volontes  of  the  king  and 
order  the  registration  of  such  as  were  in  agreement 
with  the  constitutional  laws  (lots  constitutives)  of  the 
particular  province,  as  well  as  with  the  fundamental 
laws  of  the  state." 

This  appeal  of  the  parlement  of  Paris  to  provincial 
particularism,  although  in  a  certain  sense  an  absurd 
anachronism,  was  for  the  moment  successful.  The 
ministry  had  lost  every  vestige  of  public  sympathy 
since  Calonne's  financial  revelations  of  the  year  be- 
fore, and  the  effort  to  abolish  the  local  parlements 
caused  a  number  of  serious  revolts  in  the  provinces. 
That  in  Dauphine  not  only  precipitated  the  assem- 


"THE   PRINCIPLES  OF  1789"  219 

bling  of  the  Estates  General,  but  exercised  a  most 
important  influence  upon  their  spirit  and  character. 

Now,  this  crisis  of  1788  is  an  integral  part  of  the 
movement  of  the  French  Revolution.  Although 
upon  the  surface  the  opponents  of  the  ministry  were 
merely  defending  outworn  provincial  privileges,  which 
a  year  later  were  to  be  done  away  with  forever,  the 
struggle,  at  bottom,  "was  against  absolutism  as  such. 
It  was  plain  that  not  only  were  there  numberless 
abuses  to  be  remedied,  but  also  that  the  king's  arbi- 
trary powers  must  be  limited  at  all  cost ;  for  had  not 
the  ministers  just  modified  the  whole  organization  of 
the  state  by  abohshing,  by  royal  ordinance,  in  a  most 
underhand  manner,  the  last  remnants  of  public  or 
semi-public  control  ?  The  defense  of  provincial  rights 
came  first,  but  the  issue  was  really  national. 

m 

As  was  most  natural,  the  determination  of  the  king 
to  summon  the  Estates  General  called  forth  a  great 
number  of  pamphlets,  especially  in  the  latter  half  of 
the  year  1788.  These  corresponded  in  function  to  the 
modern  newspaper  editorial,  which  very  quickly  devel- 
oped from  them.  While  they  dealt  mainly  with  the 
question  of  the  number  of  representatives  and  with 
the  method  of  voting  in  the  assembly,  some  took  up 
the  work  which  the  Estates  General  had  before  it. 
That  of  Sieyes  is  well  known,  and  its  author  occupied  an 


220  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

authoritative  position  in  the  Assembly  from  the  first. 
A  less  known  pamphlet,  published  anonymously,  but 
attributed  with  good  reason  to  Rabaut  St.  Etienne, 
the  most  radical  perhaps  of  the  more  influential  speak- 
ers in  the  Assembly  before  June  20,  appeared  a  year 
before  the  Tennis  Court  Oath,  and  set  forth  the  neces- 
sity of  establishing  a  constitution. 

So  long  as  the  changing  and  arbitrary  form  of  your  admin- 
istration continues  to  exist  [the  author  urges],  so  long  will  the 
ministers  to  whom  your  interests  are  temporarily  confided  be  in 
a  position  to  overturn  the  established  order,  modify  or  abrogate 
the  laws  and  regiilations  made  by  their  predecessors,  while  all 
your  efforts  to  correct  the  abuses  and  better  your  situation  will 
be  futile  and  without  permanent  results.  ^ 

In  determining  the  principles  of  a  good  constitution, 
while  the  author  speaks  of  those  of  Switzerland  and 
of  the  United  States,  he  evidently  recognizes  that 
England,  after  all,  furnishes  the  most  feasible  model. 
The  constitution  ought,  he  holds,  to  provide  for  two 
houses  of  legislation,  a  separation  of  the  powers  of 
government,  ministerial  responsibility,  security  of 
person  and  property,  and  liberty  of  the  press,  etc.,  — 
a  complete  program,  extracted  in  a  measure  no  doubt 
from  Montesquieu.  So  far,  however,  as  I  have  exam- 
ined the  pamphlets  of  the  times,  the  one  just  described 
seems  to  be  exceptional.     AsSorelsays:  "The  French 

^  A  la  Nation  FranQoise,  sur  les  Vices  de  son  Gouvernement,  sur  la 
NicessiU  d'etablir  une  Constitution  et  sur  la  Composition  des  Etats- 
Gin6raux.    Archives  Parlementaires,  Vol.  I,  pp.  572-573. 


"THE  PRINCIPLES  OF  1789"  221 

were  much  more  anxious  for  civil  than  for  political 
liberty."  We  find  a  great  deal  more  discussion  of 
financial  oppression  and  of  the  existing  social  and  eco- 
nomic abuses  than  of  a  proposed  political  or  constitu- 
tional reorganization. 

The  same  tendency  is  apparent  in  the  cahiefs,  the 
lists  of  grievances  and  suggestions  for  reform,  drawn 
up  according  to  an  ancient  custom  by  the  nobility 
and  clergy  of  each  electoral  district  and  by  the  com- 
moners in  town  and  country.  These  indicate  a  very 
general,  if  not  practically  universal,  desire  that  the 
despotic  government  of  the  Bourbons  should  cease. 
To  take  an  example  at  random  from  one  of  the  cahiers 
of  the  clergy,  we  find  in  Article  i,  this  statement :  "The 
fundamental  [constitutives]  laws  of  the  nation  ought  not 
to  be  based  upon  doubtful  and  obscure  traditions,  but 
established  upon  a  solid  foundation,  to  wit,  justice 
and  the  good  of  the  people."  Nothing  is  to  be  done 
in  the  assembly  of  the  Estates  General,  the  cahier 
declares,  "until  the  rights  of  the  nation  are  solemnly 
recognized  and  determined.  A  charter  containing 
these  shall  be  drawn  up,  in  which  they  shall  be  formally 
and  irrevocably  inscribed."  ^  This  is  characteristi- 
cally vague,  and,  taking  the  orders  throughout,  repre- 
sents the  average  minimum  demand.  Every  one 
seemed  to  feel  that  the  desired  civil  rights  and  free- 
dom could  only  be  secured  by  establishing  so  much  of  a 
constitution  as  would  insure  the  periodic  meetings  of 

1  S^6chauss^  de  Mans.  Archives  Parlementaire,  HI,  p.  637. 


222  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

the  Estates  General.  This  regular  participation  of 
the  nation  in  the  exercise  of  legislative  power  would 
prevent  oppression,  if  the  rights  of  the  individual  were 
once  defined  and  solemnly  and  irrevocably  reduced  to 
writing.  Such  a  course  was  not  regarded  as  implying 
any  radical  innovations.  In  fact,  in  the  case  of  some 
of  the  cahiers  of  the  nobility,  the  desire  appears  to  have 
been  to  secure  their  own  special  privileges,  which  they 
regarded  as  "fundamental  laws."  These,  if  reduced 
to  writing,  were,  it  was  argued,  not  so  likely  to  be 
questioned  in  the  future  as  they  had  been  of  recent 
years.  Taine's  assertion  that  the  nobility  in  general 
held,  with  Montesquieu,  that  France  already  had  a 
constitution,  is  not,  however,  borne  out  by  the  cahiers} 
although  there  are  some  instances  which  give  counte- 
nance to  this  view. 

The  general  desire  for  some  security  for  the  mainte- 
nance of  the  fundamental  rights  of  person  and  prop- 
erty takes  a  more  definite  form  in  certain  urban  cahiers; 
for  example,  in  that  of  the  senechaussee  of  Lyons  :  — 

Since  arbitrary  power  has  been  the  source  of  all  the  evils 
which  afflict  the  State,  our  first  desire  is  the  establishment  of  a 
really  national  constitution,  which  shall  define  the  rights  of  all 
and  provide  the  laws  to  maintain  them.  Consequently  our 
representatives  shall  request  the  Estates  General  to  decree,  and 
His  Majesty  to  sanction,  a  strictly  constitutional  law,  the  chief 
aims  of  which  shall  be  as  follows :  [a  list  of  fourteen  articles  are 
enumerated,  concluding  with  the  provision  that]  since  in  no 

'  This  is  pointed  out  by  Champion  in  his  introduction  to  his 
edition  of  Si6y^'s  pamphlet,  p.  ix,  note. 


"THE  PRINCIPLES  OF  1789"  225 

society  can  any  happiness  be  hoped  for  without  a  good  constitu- 
tion, the  Province  of  the  Lyonnais  recommends  its  deputies 
to  discuss  no  other  subject  until  the  French  constitution  shall  be 
fixed  by  the  Estates  General.  * 

We  note  in  the  cahiers  a  perfectly  natural  and  un- 
conscious confusion,  or  rather  fusion,  of  two  quite 
different  demands,  that  for  "une  regie  invariable  dans 
toutes  les  parties  de  Tadministration  et  de  I'ordre 
public,"  2  and  that  for  "une  charte  frangaise  qui  as- 
surera  pour  jamais  les  droits  du  Roi  et  de  la  nation."  ^ 
This  expression,  "rights  of  the  nation,"  appears  fre- 
quently, sometimes  with  the  correlative  "rights  of 
the  king."  But  national  rights  rested  after  all  upon  an 
uncertain  historical  basis.  Should  not  the  recurrence 
of  abuses  and  the  insidious  encroachments  of  tyranny 
be  forever  precluded  by  an  appeal  to  the  inalienable 
rights  of  each  and  every  member  of  society  ?  If  these 
and  "the  principles  of  the  social  contract"  were  clearly 
and  solemnly  proclaimed,  they  would,  it  was  hoped, 
become  the  basis  of  the  French  government.  The 
nobility  of  Mantes  and  Meulan  went  a  step  further : 
"political  principles  should,"  they  claimed,  "be  as  ab- 
solute as  those  of  morality" ;  they  asked  consequently 
for  a  "declaration  of  rights,  that  is  to  say,  an  act  by 
which  the  representatives  of  the  nation  shall  pro- 
claim in  its  name  the  rights  which  belong  to  all  men 

'  Archives  Parlementaire,  III,  pp.  608-609. 

'  Third  Estate  of  Beauvais,  Archives  Parlementaires,  II,  p.  279. 

*  Clergy  of  Caen,  Archives  Parlementaires,  II,  p.  486. 


224  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

in  their  quaKty  of  reasonable,  intelligent  beings,  ca- 
pable of  moral  ideas  —  rights  anterior  to  any  social 
institutions  [ !]."  ^ 

Nowhere  is  this  anxiety  for  a  separate  proclamation 
of  man's  natural  poHtical  immunities  clearer  than  in 
the  cahier  of  the  third  estate  of  Nemours,  which  re- 
quested the  king  to  draw  up  a  "  declaration  "  so  soon  as 
the  Estates  General  should  have  set  forth  the  natural 
and  social  rights  of  man  and  the  citizen.  This  declara- 
tion was  to  be  registered  in  all  the  courts,  pubhshed 
several  times  a  year  in  all  the  churches,  and  inserted 
in  all  the  books  destined  for  the  earliest  childhood. 
No  one  should  be  admitted  to  any  judicial  or  admin- 
istrative office  without  having  repeated  the  declaration 
from  memory.  This  cahier,  moreover,  furnishes  an 
elaborate  draft  of  such  a  bill  of  rights,  as  do  a  number 
of  others,  including  the  cahier  of  Paris  intra  muros. 

This  last  was  drawn  up  later  than  the  rest,  not  being 
completed  imtil  after  May  5,  the  day  upon  which  the 
Estates  General  met.  The  committee  appointed  to 
draft  the  cahier  included  a  number  of  distinguished 
men,  and  the  result  of  their  dehberations  is  the  most 
complete  scheme  of  a  constitution  which  appeared 
before  that  drawn  up  in  the  National  Assembly  itself. 
The  first  division  of  the  cahier  is  devoted  to  this  subject, 
and  the  representatives  of  Paris  "are  expressly  for- 
bidden to  consent  to  any  subsidy  or  loan  until  the 
declaration  of  the  rights  of  the  nation  shall  have  be- 

^  Archives  Parlementaires,  Vol.  m,  p.  661. 


"THE  PRINCIPLES  OF  1789"  22$ 

come  a  law,  and  the  foundations  of  a  constitution  are 
agreed  upon  and  assured."  The  draft  of  the  constitu- 
tion is  preceded,  Uke  that  actually  decreed  later  in  the 
National  Assembly,  by  a  declaration  of  rights,  which 
the  cahier  claims  should  "constitute  a  national  charter 
and  form  the  basis  of  the  French  government."  No 
other  cahier^  so  far  as  I  have  observed,  except  that  of 
Nemours,  contains  "so  clear  a  statement  of  this  char- 
acteristic idea  that  the  declaration  of  rights  is  an  essen- 
tial element  of  the  constitution.  Not  only  was  this 
suggestion  accepted  by  the  National  Assembly,  which, 
as  is  well  known,  formulated  the  "Declaration  of  the 
Rights  of  Man  and  the  Citizen"  before  proceeding  to 
the  constitution  itself,  but  the  clauses  themselves,  as 
they  appear  in  this  cahier  of  Paris,  are  strikingly  sim- 
ilar to  those  finally  adopted  by  the  assembly.  The 
importance  of  the  well-ordered  constitutional  pro- 
visions suggested  in  the  cahier  can  best  be  estimated 
by  their  close  approach  to  those  of  the  constitution 
of  1 791.    Among  them  are  the  following :  — 

In  the  French  monarchy  the  legislative  power  belongs  to 
the  nation  in  conjunction  with  the  king.  The  executive  power 
belongs  to  the  king  alone. 

The  Estates  General  shall  be  periodically  convoked  every 
three  years,  without,  however,  excluding  extraordinary  sessions. 
They  shall  never  adjourn  without  indicating  the  day  and  place 
of  their  next  session. 

Any  one  convicted  of  an  attempt  to  prevent  the  assembling 
of  the  Estates  General  shall  be  declared  a  traitor  to  his  coun- 
try, guilty  of  the  crime  of  Ihse-nation  [sicl]. 
Q 


226  THE  NEW  fflSTORY 

In  the  intervals  between  the  sessions  of  the  Estates  General, 
only  provisional  regulations  may  be  issued  in  execution  of  that 
which  has  been  decreed  in  the  preceding  Estates  General,  nor 
can  these  regulations  be  made  laws,  except  in  the  following 
Estates  General, 

Many  more  examples  might  be  given  to  illustrate  the 
similarity  between  this  sketch  and  the  plan  ultimately 
adopted.    The  cahier  claims  that 

the  constitution  which  shall  be  drawn  up  by  the  present  Estates 
General,  according  to  the  principles  which  have  just  been  set 
forth,  shall  be  the  property  of  the  nation,  and  may  not  be 
changed  or  modified  except  by  the  constituent  power,  that  is  to 
say,  by  the  nation  itself,  or  by  its  representatives  elected  ad  hoc 
by  the  whole  body  of  citizens  for  the  single  pxirpose  of  supple- 
menting or  perfecting  this  constitution. 

The  confidence  in  a  declaration  of  rights  is  not  diffi- 
cult to  explain.  The  French  nation  at  large  had  no 
idea  of  the  tremendous  difficulty  of  completely  re- 
organizing the  government  upon  a  new  plan.  Few, 
if  any,  foresaw  that  the  constitution  would  be,  when 
completed,  a  very  lengthy  legal  document.  The 
people,  while  they  longed  for  a  fundamental  change, 
did  not  care  much  about  the  intricacies  of  the  govern- 
mental system.  They  wanted,  above  all,  to  secure 
their  civil  liberty;  they  cared  little  to  participate  in 
the  government,  but  were  only  anxious  to  control  it 
so  far  as  to  prevent  the  revival  of  old  abuses.  Two 
or  three  things  were  clear  to  them :  The  king  and  his 
ministers  were  wasting  the  public  funds  and  had  got 


"THE  PRINCIPLES  OF  1789"  227 

the  state  into  serious  financial  straits;  the  ministers, 
too,  had  but  recently  tried  to  abolish  arbitrarily  an 
ancient  and,  on  the  whole,  popular  institution,  the 
parlements ,  so  as  to  consolidate  their  despotism  and 
shake  off  the  last  constitutional  guaranty;  certain 
governmental  practices  were  open  and  scandalous 
violations  of  the  most  obvious  rights  of  humanity; 
and,  finally,  the  general  anarchy  of  the  Ancien  Regime 
hampered  commerce  and  industry  and  brought  home 
the  evils  of  the  situation  to  thousands  who  had  never 
read  a  word  of  Rousseau  or  seen  a  single  line  of  the 
constitution  of  Massachusetts.  The  nobles  of  La 
Rochelle  explained  clearly  enough  the  reasons  why  a 
distinct  statement  of  the  fundamental  laws  and  civil 
guaranties  was  demanded  by  practically  the  whole 
nation. 

We  behold  taxes  of  all  kinds  arbitrarily  depriving  the  sub- 
ject of  his  possessions;  privileged  monopolies  paralyzing  ac- 
tivity; lettres  de  cachet  fettering  liberty,  saving  the  guilty  and 
putting  the  innocent  in  chains;  commissions  suspending  the 
laws  and  turning  the  courts  of  justice  upside  down ;  each  min- 
ister reversing  the  arrangements  of  his  predecessors.^ 

In  view  of  these  declarations  M.  Champion  is  correct 
in  his  assertion :  — 

The  classical  spirit,  the  taste  for  abstractions,  a  priori  sys- 
tems, may  have  had  some  influence  in  the  drawing  up  of  certain 
cahiers;  but  the  idea  of  making  a  constitution  did  not  come 
from  philosophy  nor  from  a  noble  frenzy ;  it  was  called  forth  by 

*  Archives  Parlementaires,  Vol.  Ill,  p.  47a. 


228  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

the  public  misfortunes.  Had  there  never  been  a  Social  Contract^ 
the  idea  would  have  been  propagated  by  the  force  of  circum- 
stances. Why  impute  to  mean  or  evil  sentiments  a  demand 
which  is  so  well  explained  by  the  state  of  the  kingdom,  which 
had  become  a  veritable  chaos  ?  * 

The  French,  long  conscious  of  the  abuses  of  their 
system  of  government,  and  anxious  to  insure  their 
liberties  by  limiting  the  prerogatives  of  their  monarch, 
turned  their  minds  naturally  and  inevitably  to  a  species 
of  written  guaranty  which  should  give  definiteness 
to  the  chief  fundamental  laws  of  the  state.  The  very 
insistence  placed  upon  the  declaration  of  the  rights  of 
man  showed  that  the  people  had  in  view  a  charter  in 
the  English  sense  of  the  word  rather  than  an  elab- 
orately wrought  out  constitution,  like  that  of  1791. 
"No  one  denies  now,"  Mirabeau  once  remarked  with 
characteristic  insight,^  "that  the  French  nation  was 
prepared  for  the  revolution  which  has  just  taken 
place  rather  through  a  consciousness  of  its  ills  and  the 
faults  of  its  government  than  by  the  general  advance 
of  knowledge.  Every  one  was  conscious  of  what 
should  be  destroyed;  no  one  knew  what  should  be 
established." 

IV 

This  brief  review  of  the  crisis  of  1788  and  of  the 
public  spirit  shown  in  the  cahiers  renders  the  attitude 

*  La  France  d'apris  les  cahiers  de  1789,  pp.  39-40. 

'  Twenty-third  note  to  the  court  in  correspondence  with  Lamarck. 


"THE  PRINCIPLES  OF  1789"  229 

of  the  National  Assembly  perfectly  intelligible.  The 
Third  Estate,  on  June  17,  1789,  proclaimed  its  mission 
to  be  the  determination  of  the  principles  of  national 
regeneration.  On  July  9  its  committee  on  the  consti- 
tution made  its  first  report,  and  an  excellent  report  it 
was.  The  distinction  between  a  constitution  —  an 
established  system  of  government  —  and  a  declaration 
of  rights  was  carefully  laid  down.  In  order  to  prepare 
a  good  constitution,  the  report  said,  "it  is  necessary 
to  recognize  the  rights  which  natural  justice  grants 
to  every  individual,  and  to  recall  all  those  principles 
which  must  form  the  basis  of  every  kind  of  society." 
The  committee  recommended  that,  in  order  to  keep 
in  view  the  object  of  the  constitution,  it  should  be  pre- 
ceded by  a  declaration  of  the  rights  of  man,  but  that 
this  should  not  be  issued  separately,  for  fear  that  its 
provisions  might  prove  too  abstract  if  unaccompanied 
by  the  concrete  provisions  of  the  constitution. 

Thus  a  declaration  of  the  rights  of  man  was  to  be 
drawn  up  in  answer  to  a  very  general  demand.  Very 
few,  if  any,  of  the  deputies  deprecated  the  declaration, 
and  on  August  4  it  was  decided,  by  a  practically  vmani- 
mous  vote,  that  it  should  precede  the  constitution. 
There  is  no  need  to  follow  here  the  somewhat  depress- 
ing discussion  in  regard  to  its  contents.  It  reached 
its  final  form  on  August  26,  and  had  occupied  the  main 
attention  of  the  Assembly,  at  different  intervals,  for 
perhaps  a  fortm'ght  altogether.  Was  this  time  wasted, 
or  worse  than  wasted  ?    Did  the  deputies  lose  them- 


230  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

selves  in  vague  and  misleading  abstractions  and  so 
sacrifice  the  best  interests  of  the  nation  to  mere  theories 
and  prepare  the  way  for  far  worse  calamities  than  those 
which  they  pretended  to  remedy?  Or,  on  the  other 
hand,  were  the  principles  of  their  declaration  upon  the 
whole  sound,  general  rather  than  abstractly  theoretical, 
dictated  by  years  of  national  experience,  and  well 
fitted  to  form  the  program  of  their  great  undertaking  ? 
Before  attempting  to  answer  these  questions,  let  us 
read  over  once  more  the  declaration  itself  —  it  is  brief 
and  instructive. 

The  representatives  of  the  French  people,  organized  as  a 
national  assembly,  believing  that  the  ignorance,  neglect,  or  con- 
tempt of  the  rights  of  man  are  the  sole  causes  of  public  calam- 
ities and  of  the  corruption  of  governments,  have  determined  to 
set  forth  in  a  solemn  declaration,  the  natural,  inalienable,  and 
sacicd  rights  of  man,  in  order  that  this  declaration,  being  con- 
stantly before  all  the  members  of  the  social  body,  shall  remind 
them  continually  of  their  rights  and  duties;  in  order  that  the 
acts  of  the  legislative  power,  as  well  as  those  of  the  executive 
power,  may  be  compared  at  any  moment  with  the  ends  of  all 
poUtical  institutions  and  may  thus  be  more  respected;  and, 
lastly,  in  order  that  the  grievances  of  the  citizens,  based  here- 
after upon  simple  and  incontestable  principles,  shall  tend  to  the 
maintenance  of  the  constitution  and  redound  to  the  happiness 
of  all.  Therefore,  the  national  assembly  recognizes  and  pro- 
claims in  the  presence  and  imder  the  auspices  of  the  Supreme 
Being  the  following  rights  of  man  and  of  the  citizen :  — 

Article  i.  Men  are  bom  and  remain  free  and  equal  in 
rights.  Social  distinctions  may  only  be  founded  upon  the  gen- 
eral good. 

2.  The  aim  of  all  political  association  is  the  preservation 


"THE  PRINCIPLES  OF  1789"  23 1 

of  the  natural  and  imprescriptible  rights  of  man.    These  rights 
are  liberty,  property,  security,  and  resistance  to  oppression. 

3.  The  essence  [principe]  of  all  sovereignty  resides  essen- 
tially in  the  nation.  No  body  nor  individual  may  exercise  any 
authority  which  does  not  proceed  directly  from  the  nation. 

4.  Liberty  consists  in  the  freedom  to  do  everything  which 
injures  no  one  else ;  hence  the  exercise  of  the  natiu-al  rights  of 
each  man  has  no  limits  except  those  which  assure  to  the  other 
members  of  society  the-  enjoyment  of  the  same  rights.  These 
limits  can  only  be  determined  by  law. 

5.  Law  can  only  prohibit  such  actions  as  are  hurtful  to  society. 
Nothing  may  be  prevented  which  is  not  forbidden  by  law,  and 
no  one  may  be  forced  to  do  anything  not  provided  for  by  law. 

6.  Law  is  the  expression  of  the  general  will.  Every  citizen 
has  a  right  to  participate  personally,  or  through  his  representa- 
tive, in  its  enactment.  It  must  be  the  same  for  aU,  whether  it 
protects  or  punishes.  AU  citizens,  being  equal  in  the  eyes  of 
the  law,  are  equally  eligible  to  all  dignities  and  to  all  pubUc  posi- 
tions and  occupations,  according  to  their  abilities  and  without 
distinction,  except  that  of  their  virtues  and  talents. 

7.  No  person  shall  be  accused,  arrested,  or  imprisoned  except 
in  the  cases  and  according  to  the  forms  prescribed  by  law.  Any 
one  soliciting,  transmitting,  executing,  or  causing  to  be  executed 
any  arbitrary  order  shall  be  punished.  But  any  citizen  sum- 
moned or  arrested  in  virtue  of  the  law  shall  submit  without  delay, 
as  resistance  constitutes  an  offense. 

8.  The  law  shall  provide  for  such  punishments  only  as  are 
strictiy  and  obviously  necessary,  and  no  one  shall  suffer  punish- 
ment except  it  be  legally  inflicted  in  virtue  of  a  law,  passed  and 
promulgated  before  the  commission  of  the  offense. 

9.  As  all  persons  are  held  innocent  until  they  shall  have 
been  declared  guilty,  if  arrest  shall  be  deemed  indispensable,  all 
severity  not  essential  to  the  securing  ot  the  prisoner's  person  shall 
be  severely  repressed  by  law. 


232  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

10.  No  one  shall  be  disquieted  on  account  of  his  opinions, 
including  his  religious  views,  provided  their  manifestation  does 
not  disturb  the  public  order  established  by  law. 

11.  The  free  communication  of  ideas  and  opinions  is  one  of 
the  most  precious  of  the  rights  of  man.  Every  citizen  may,  ac- 
cordingly, speak,  write,  and  print  with  freedom,  but  shall  be 
responsible  for  such  abuses  of  this  freedom  as  shall  be  defined  by 
law. 

12.  The  security  of  the  rights  of  man  and  of  the  citizen  re- 
quires public  military  force.  These  forces  are,  therefore,  es- 
tablished for  the  good  of  all  and  not  for  the  personal  advantage 
of  those  to  whom  they  shall  be  intrusted. 

13.  A  common  contribution  is  essential  for  the  maintenance 
of  the  public  forces  and  for  the  cost  of  administration.  This 
should  be  equitably  distributed  among  all  the  citizens  in  propor- 
tion to  their  means. 

14.  All  citizens  have  a  right  to  decide,  either  personally  or 
through  their  representatives,  as  to  the  necessity  of  the  pubUc 
contribution ;  to  grant  this  freely ;  to  know  to  what  uses  it  is 
put ;  and  to  fix  the  amoimt,  the  mode  of  assessment  and  of  col- 
lection, and  the  duration  of  the  taxes. 

15.  Society  has  the  right  to  require  of  every  public  agent 
an  account  of  his  administration. 

16.  A  society  in  which  the  observance  of  the  law  is  not 
assured,  nor  the  separation  of  powers  defined,  has  no  constitu- 
tion at  all. 

17.  Since  property  is  an  inviolable  and  sacred  right,  no 
one  shall  be  deprived  thereof  except  in  cases  where  pubUc  neces- 
sity, legally  determined,  shall  clearly  require  it,  and  then  only 
on  condition  that  the  owner  shall  have  been  previously  and 
equitably  indemnified. 

Do  not  these  "principles  of  1789"  represent  the 
most  commonplace  assumptions  of  European  govern- 


"THE  PRINCIPLES  OF  1789"  233 

ments  to-day  ?  And  yet  every  one  of  them  was  neg- 
lected by  every  European  government  in  the  eigh- 
teenth century,  if  we  except  England.  M,  Seignobos 
reminds  us  that  "when  a  Frenchman  turned  his  atten- 
tion to  political  questions  in  the  eighteenth  century, 
most  of  the  institutions  in  the  midst  of  which  he  lived 
appeared  to  him  to  be  abuses  contrary  to  reason  and 
humanity."  Now,"  if  we  are  not  prejudiced  against 
the  Declaration  of  the  Rights  of  Man  by  careless  and 
hostile  critics  and  by  the  suggestions  made  during 
the  debates  by  Sieyes  and  others, — which  certainly 
reached  a  degree  of  fatuity  rarely  exceeded  in  the  most 
futile  of  parhamentary  discussions,  —  and  if  we  neglect 
one  or  two  oratorical  flourishes,  do  we  not  find  it  to  be, 
after  all,  simply  a  dignified  and  succinct  repudiation 
of  les  abus  ?  Is  it  not  a  concrete  and  positive,  although 
general,  statement  of  the  practical  reforms  which  the 
Assembly  was  in  duty  boimd  to  reahze?  Was  there 
not  back  of  each  article  some  crying  evil  of  long  stand- 
ing, in  view  of  which  the  nation  might  expect  a  com- 
prehensive constitutional  guaranty  ? 

The  Declaration  is  evidently  the  result  of  a  compro- 
mise and  reflects  the  confusion  which  reigns  in  the 
cahiers.  Some  wanted  to  enumerate  the  rights  of  man 
before  he  became  a  social  being;  others  held  that  rights 
could  only  result  from  a  contract;  still  others  wished 
to  formulate  only  such  general  principles  as  might  be 
associated  with  the  practical  reform  of  existing  insti- 
tutions.    It  seems  that  this  last  party  of  discretion 


234  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

and  sense  was  practically  successful  in  the  long  run. 
They  were  not  so  conspicuous  in  the  debates  as  the 
doctrinaire  groups,  but  the  obvious  superiority  of  the 
final  draft  to  all  previously  submitted  is  a  tribute  to 
the  good  sense  of  the  Assembly,  which  knew  how  to 
repress  the  vagaries  of  the  more  fantastical  deputies.^ 

It  will  be  noted  that  in  the  text  of  the  constitution  of 
1 791  the  Declaration  of  the  Rights  of  Man  is  followed, 
without  a  break,  by  the  expHcit  abolition  of  a  number 
of  the  most  serious  vices  of  the  Ancien  Regime ;  and 
following  this  is  a  hst  of  the  natural  and  civil  rights 
guaranteed  by  the  constitution. 

To  the  greatest  statesman  of  the  Assembly,  Mirabeau, 
the  Declaration  was  in  theory  the  "exposition  of  cer- 
tain general  principles,  valid  for  every  political  society 
and  every  form  of  government."  Nevertheless,  in  pre- 
paring a  statement  of  these  principles  for  the  existing 
body  politic  —  "  vieux  et  presque  caduc  "  —  it  was  ab- 

^  Some  of  the  most  important  articles  only  ratified  concessions 
already  made  by  the  king  or  reforms  introduced  by  the  Assembly  in 
the  great  decree  abolishing  the  feudal  system.  The  king  had  prom- 
ised on  June  23  that  the  representatives  of  the  nation  should  grant 
the  taxes,  that  a  yearly  budget  should  be  published,  that  privileges 
should  exist  no  longer  in  the  payment  of  taxes,  and  had  asked  the  es- 
tates to  confer  with  him  upon  the  abolition  of  the  lettres  de  cachet  and 
the  maintenance  of  the  liberty  of  the  press.  Then,  by  the  decree  of 
August  II,  the  Assembly  had  abolished  the  sale  of  judicial  and  munici- 
pal offices  and  declared  all  citizens  eligible  to  office  without  distinc- 
tion of  birth.  These  concessions  of  the  king  and  this  legislation  of  the 
Assembly  made  sufficiently  real  several  important  articles  in  the  later 
declaration. 


"THE  PRINCIPLES  OF  1789"  23$ 

solutely  necessary  to  subordinate  and  adapt  them  to 
''many  local  circumstances."  The  object,  Mirabeau 
declared,  was 

to  recall  to  the  people,  not  what  they  had  got  from  books  or 
abstract  meditations,  but  what  they  themselves  had  experienced, 
so  that  the  Declaration  of  Rights,  from  which  a  poUtical  body 
should  not  deviate,  should  be  such  a  statement  as  it  would  itself 
naturally  make,  were  it  accustomed  to  express  its  ideas  —  not 
an  effort  to  teach  a  science. 

This  is,  gendemen,  a  most  essential  distinction.  Since  Ub- 
erty  has  never  been  the  fruit  of  theory  resulting  from  philosoph- 
ical deductions,  but  springs  from  everyday  experience  and  the 
simple  reasoning  which  events  excite,  it  foUows  that  we  shall  be 
the  better  understood  the  nearer  we  approach  to  this  reason- 
ing. .  .  .  This  is  the  way  in  which  the  Americans  drew  up 
their  declaration  of  rights.  They  purposely  left  theory  to  one 
side  and  stated  the  poUtical  truths  which  were  to  be  defined,  in 
such  a  form  that  they  might  appeal  to  the  people,  to  whom  alone 
liberty  is  important,  and  who  alone  can  maintain  it.^ 

*  Hist.  Pari.,  II,  pp.  269,  270. 


THE   SPIRIT   OF   CONSERVATISM   IN 
THE   LIGHT   OF   HISTORY 


It  is  a  long,  long  time  since  human  history  began, 
when  a  species  of  apes,  probably  closely  allied  to  the 
gorilla  and  chimpanzee  of  the  African  forests,  found 
itself  able  to  go  on  its  hind  legs  without  the  as- 
sistance of  its  fore  limbs,  leaving  these  free  to  be- 
come ever  more  dexterous  arms  and  hands.  This 
new  being,  with  his  good,  big  brain  case,  found  that 
his  ability  to  do  things  with  his  hands  begat  a 
tendency  to  use  his  advantages  in  novel  ways.  Acci- 
dentally casting  bits  of  flint  into  the  fire,  he  perceived 
that  they  would  crack  into  convenient  pieces  for  cut- 
ting and  scraping,  and  so  he  perhaps  made  his  first 
tools.  What  manner  of  creature  he  was  —  whether 
still  hairy,  and  sleeping,  mayhap,  in  trees  like  his  con- 
geners, the  apes  of  to-day  —  is  a  matter  of  conjecture. 
The  veteran  French  archaeologist,  de  Mortillet,  con- 
jectures that  the  earliest  of  the  chipped  stone  tools 
found  in  the  drift  along  river  banks  may  be  assigned 
to  a  period  extending  back  two  hundred  and  forty  thou- 
sand years.  Suppose  we  allow  some  two  hundred  and 
fifty  thousand  years  back  of  that  for  the  ancestors  of 

236 


THE  SPIRIT  OF  CONSERVATISM  237 

paleolithic  man,  the  makers  of  the  so-called  "dawn 
stones"  (eoliths),  we  arrive  at  the  conclusion  that  man 
and  his  upright  forerunners  have  lived  on  the  earth 
for  at  least  half  a  million  of  years.  ^  I  think  that  few 
versed  in  prehistoric  archaeology  or  in  biology  would 
feel  inclined  to  reduce  this  period,  although  we  have 
no  way  of  determining  it  with  any  satisfactory  degree 
of  accuracy.  Now  to  judge  from  the  cavern  remains, 
it  would  appear  that  no  very  great  progress  was 
made  except  in  the  skill  with  which  the  flints  were 
chipped,  in  the  variety  of  their  forms,  and  in  the 
decoration  of  bone  objects,  imtil  perhaps  ten  thou- 
sand years  ago,  when  the  so-called  neolithic  or  ground 
stone  period,  with  its  pottery,  its  agriculture,  and 
its  rude  dwellings,  comes  clearly  into  sight.  The 
American  aborigines  were  still  in  the  neoHthic  age 
when  the  first  Europeans  arrived  in  the  late  fifteenth 
century. 

These  facts  about  man's  past  are  still  such  compara- 
tively recent  discoveries  that  they  have  not  as  yet  so 
fundamentally  revolutionized  our  thought  as  they 
should  and  will.  Lyell's  famous  book  on  The  An- 
tiquity of  Man,  which  first  brought  the  great  age  of  the 
human  species  to  the  knowledge  of  intelligent  English 
readers,  was  published  in  1863.     It  is  true  that  Augus- 

^  De  Mortillet,  G.  et  A.,  La  Prihistoire,  Paris  s.  d.  (1910),  pp. 
663  sq.  Even  archaeologists  who  are  unconvinced  that  the  so-called 
"eoliths"  indicate  human  adaptations  do  not  usually  question  the  fact 
that  man  had  probably  used  flint  and  shells  long  before  the  "fist 
hatchet "  was  elaborated. 


238  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

tine  found  it  necessary,  in  order  to  secure  precedence 
for  the  Hebrew  prophets,  to  refute  the  "lying  vanity" 
of  certain  authors  who  maintained  that  the  Egyptians 
had  been  carrying  on  their  astronomical  observations 
for  no  less  than  a  hundred  thousand  years.  How  was 
this  possible,  he  scornfully  asks,  when  not  six  thousand 
years  have  elapsed  since  the  creation  of  the  first  man  ?  ^ 
This  estimate  of  the  great  church  father  was  somewhat 
reduced  by  an  Enghsh  prelate.  Archbishop  Usher,  in 
the  time  of  Cromwell.  With  laudable  precision  he 
assigned  to  Friday,  October  28,  4004  b.c,  the  creation 
of  all  the  terrestrial  animals  and  the  appearance  of 
Adam,  who,  wholly  inexperienced  as  he  was,  was  called 
upon  to  devise  a  complete  zoological  nomenclature. 
Before  the  close  of  the  day  Eve  was  created  to  solace  his 
loneliness,  and  the  nuptials,  duly  performed,  consti- 
tuted the  last  act  of  the  first  working  week.^  Although 
some  thoughtful  philosophers  and  theologians  of  the 
early  church  had  expressed  doubts  as  to  the  literal 
truth  of  this  account,  Archbishop  Usher's  exactitude 
foimd  favor  in  the  eyes  of  Protestants  in  the  seven- 
teenth century,  and  it  was  left  for  Darwin,  Lyell, 
Huxley,  and  the  anthropologists  fundamentally  to 
readjust  our  historical  perspective,  not  half  a  cen- 
tury since. 

^De  Civitate  Dei,  ed.  Dombart  (Teubner  edition),  lib.  XVIII, 
cap.  40:  "De  AegjTJtiorum  mendacissima  vanitate,  quae  antiquitati 
scientiae  suae  centum  milia  ascribit  annorum." 

*  Annales  veteris  Testamenti  a  prima  mundi  origine  dediidi,  London. 
1651,  p.  I. 


THE  SPIRIT  OF  CONSERVATISM  239 

In  order  to  understand  the  light  which  the  discovery 
of  the  vast  age  of  mankind  casts  on  our  present  posi- 
tion, our  relation  to  the  past  and  our  hopes  for  the 
future,  let  us  borrow,  with  some  modifications,  an 
ingenious  device  for  illustrating  modern  historical 
perspective.^  Let  us  imagine  the  whole  history  of 
mankind  crowded  into  twelve  hours,  and  that  we  are 
living  at  noon  of  the  long  human  day.  Let  us,  in  the 
interest  of  moderation  and  convenient  reckoning, 
assiune  that  man  has  been  upright  and  engaged  in 
seeking  out  inventions  for  only  two  hundred  and  forty 
thousand  years.  Each  hour  on  our  clock  will  then 
represent  twenty  thousand  years,  each  minute  three 
hundred  and  thirty-three  and  a  third  years.  For  over 
eleven  and  a  half  hours  nothing  was  recorded.  We 
know  of  no  persons  or  events ;  we  only  infer  that  man 
was  living  on  the  earth,  for  we  find  his  stone  tools,  bits 
of  his  pottery,  and  some  of  his  pictures  of  mammoths 
and  bison.  Not  until  twenty  minutes  before  twelve 
do  the  earliest  vestiges  of  Egyptian  and  Babylonian 
civilization  begin  to  appear.  The  Greek  hterature, 
philosophy,  and  science  of  which  we  have  been  accus- 
tomed to  speak  as  "ancient,"  are  not  seven  minutes 
old.  At  one  minute  before  twelve  Lord  Bacon  wrote 
his  Advancement  of  Learning,  to  which  we  shall  recur 
presently,  and  not    half  a  minute  has  elapsed  since 

*  One  of  Haeckel's  students,  Heinrich  Schmidt,  seems  to  have  first 
hit  upon  this  method  of  representing  "  cosmological  perspective." 
See  Lester  F.  Ward,  Pure  Sociology,  1907,  p.  38,  note. 


24©  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

man  first  began  to  make  the  steam  engine  do  his  work 
for  him.  There  is,  I  think,  nothing  delusive  about 
this  reduced  scale  of  things.  It  is  much  easier  for 
us  to  handle  and  speculate  upon  than  the  life-sized 
picture,  which  so  transcends  our  experience  that  we 
cannot  grasp  it. 

Two  reflections  are  obvious :  In  the  first  place, 
those  whom  we  call  the  ancients  —  Thales,  Pythago- 
ras, Socrates,  Plato,  Aristotle,  Hipparchus,  Lucretius 
—  are  really  our  contemporaries.  However  remote 
they  may  have  seemed  on  Archbishop  Usher's  plan  of 
the  past,  they  now  belong  to  our  own  age.  We  have 
no  reason  whatever  to  suppose  that  their  minds  were 
better  or  worse  than  ours,  except  in  point  of  knowledge, 
which  has  been  accimiulating  since  their  day.  In  the 
second  place,  we  are  struck  by  the  fact  that  man's 
progress  was  at  first  shockingly  slow,  well-nigh  im- 
perceptible for  tens  of  thousands  of  years,  but  that  it 
tends  to  increase  in  rapidity  with  an  ever  accelerating 
tempo.  Our  forefathers,  the  drift  men,  may  have 
satisfied  themselves  for  a  hundred  thousand  years  with 
a  single  stone  implement,  the  so-called  coup  de  poing 
or  fist  hatchet,  used,  as  Sir  John  Lubbock  surmises, 
for  as  many  purposes  as  a  boy's  jackknife.  In  time 
they  learned  to  make  scrapers,  borers,  arrow-heads, 
harpoon  points,  and  rude  needles  of  flint  and  bone. 
But  it  was  scarcely  more  than  half  an  hour  before 
twelve  by  our  clock  that  they  can  be  shown  to  have 
invented  pottery  and  become  the  possessors  of  herds. 


THE  SPIRIT  OF  CONSERVATISM  24I 

The  use  of  bronze  and  iron  is  much  more  recent,  and 
the  men  of  the  bronze  age  still  retained  a  pious  de- 
votion to  the  venerable  stone  hatchet,  which  the  priests 
appear  to  have  continued  to  use  to  slay  their  victims, 
long  after  the  metals  began  to  be  used. 

The  Greeks  were  the  first  of  all  peoples,  so  far  as 
we  know,  to  use  their  minds  freely.  They  imques- 
tionably  demonstrated  the  capacity  of  our  intellects 
in  ethics,  metaphysics,  logic,  and  mathematics,  but  the 
incalculable  importance  of  the  common  things  round 
about  them  escaped  them  in  the  main.  Aristotle 
seems  to  have  conceived  that  all  the  practical  arts  had 
already  been  discovered.  He  was  willing  that  the  slaves 
should  be  left  to  carry  them  on,  while  the  philoso- 
phers reasoned  on  the  ideals  of  a  contemplative  life, 
—  on  the  good,  the  true,  and  the  beautiful.  Doubtless 
some  advance  was  suggested  in  what  we  should  call 
applied  science,  especially  at  Alexandria,  but  conditions 
were  unpropitious,  and  mankind  had  no  better  ways  of 
meeting  his  practical  needs  in  Roman  times  than  he 
had  before  Aristotle  summed  up  all  the  achievements 
of  the  preceding  Greek  thinkers.  The  great  Christian 
fathers,  Jerome,  Augustine,  Ambrose,  if  they  did  not 
think  material  things  absolutely  bad,  at  least  had  no 
interest  in  them.^  Their  gaze  was  fixed  on  the  rela- 
tion of  the  soul  to  Cjod.  This  transcended  knowledge. 
Their  contemporaries,  the  Neoplatonists,  maintained 
that  the  highest  truth  came  through  intuition.   Reason 

»  Henry  Osbom  Taylor,  The  Mediavd  Mind,  191 1,  Ch.  IV. 


242  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

could  reveal  at  best  only  unimportant  matters.  Both 
Neoplatonists  and  Christians  were  far  more  interested 
in  miracles  and  various  magical  and  sacramental 
methods  of  promoting  man's  heavenly  interests  than 
in  a  study  of  God's  world.  It  was  with  this  heritage 
that  the  Middle  Ages  began.  A  great  part  of  what 
had  been  known  in  the  Fathers'  time  was  forgotten. 
The  textbooks  handed  down  a  little  Greek  knowledge, 
half  understood  and  mixed  with  incredible  errors. 
The  natural  world  was  looked  upon  as  at  best  a  sort 
of  gigantic  allegory.  The  minerals  possessed  moral  and 
magical  virtues,  rather  than  chemical  and  physical.  The 
alleged  habits  of  the  lion  recalled  the  death  and  resur- 
rection of  Christ,  and  those  of  the  wren  illustrated  our 
dependence  on  the  past.  With  the  rediscovery  of  Aris- 
totle's works,  which  were  prayerfully  studied  in  the 
imiversities  in  the  thirteenth  century  and  elaborately 
explained  and  interpreted  by  the  great  Dominican 
friars,  Albert  the  Great  and  Thomas  Aquinas,  a  new 
barrier  was  erected  to  the  fruitful  study  of  nature  and 
the  appHcation  of  knowledge  to  man's  material  wel- 
fare. All  of  Aristotle's  mistakes  as  well  as  all  of  the 
mistakes  of  his  new  interpreters,  became  sanctified. 

Roger  Bacon,  the  first  person,  so  far  as  we  know,  to 
express  an  unbounded  confidence  in  the  possibilities 
of  experimental  science,  impatiently  declared  that  it 
would  be  far  better  if  all  the  works  of  Aristotle  were 
destroyed  than  that  the  universities  should  be  en- 
gaged in  attempting  to  get  at  the  sense  of  the  bad  Latin 


THE  SPIRIT  OF  CONSERVATISM  243 

translations  upon  which  they  were  dependent.  Aris- 
totle, he  concedes,  certainly  knew  a  great  deal ;  but  at 
best  he  only  planted  the  tree  of  knowledge,  and  it 
had  still  many  branches  to  put  forth.  "If  we  mortals 
could  continue  to  live  for  countless  centuries,  we  could 
never  hope  to  reach  full  and  complete  knowledge  of  all 
that  is  to  be  known."  Bacon  held  that  the  intelligent 
man  of  science  should  acquaint  himself  with  the  simple, 
homely  things  that  farmers  and  old  women  know  about. 
While  in  many  ways  the  victim  of  his  age,  Roger 
Bacon,  a  little  over  six  hundred  years  ago,  gave  first 
expression  to  the  promise  of  man's  happiness  that  lay 
in  a  study  of  plain  material  things.  Experimental 
science,^  he  prophesied,  would  enable  men  to  move 
ships  without  rowers,  carriages  might  be  propelled 
at  an  incredible  speed  without  animals  to  draw  them, 
flying  machines  could  be  devised  to  navigate  the  air 
like  birds,  and  bridges  might  be  constructed  without 
supports  ingeniously  to  span  rivers.^ 

These  tentative  and  seemingly  fantastic  suggestions 
came — to  revert  to  our  clock  —  about  two  minutes  be- 

*  Perhaps  the  most  striking  presentation  of  Bacon's  view  is  to  be 
found  in  the  following  words :  "  Quia  licet  per  tria  sciamus,  videlicet 
per  auctoritatem,  et  rationem,  et  experientiam,  tamen  auctoritas  non 
sapit  nisi  detur  ejus  ratio,  nee  dat  intellectum  sed  credulitatem ; 
credimus  enim  auctoritati,  sed  non  propter  earn  intelligimus.  Nee 
ratio  potest  scire  an  sophisma  vel  demonstratio,  nisi  conclusionem 
sciamus  experiri  per  opera."  Compendium  studii,  Opera  Inedita, 
ed.  Brewer,  p.  397. 

*  "Epistola  Fratris  Rogerii  Baconis  de  secretis  operibus  artis  et 
naturae,"  loc.  cit.,  pp.  532  sqq. 


244  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

fore  twelve.  A  whole  minute  more  was  required  before 
the  expostulations  of  Roger  Bacon  were  really  heeded. 
The  leaders  of  Protestantism  had  no  heart  in  what  we 
call  progress.  Luther  decried  reason  as  a  "pretty  har- 
lot" who  would  blind  us  to  the  great  truths  God  had 
revealed  in  the  Bible.  Melanchthon  .reedited  with 
enthusiastic  approval  an  ancient  astrology.  Calvin 
declared  man  innately  and  unspeakably  bad  and 
corrupt,  utterly  incapable  of  essentially  bettering  him- 
self. But  Pomponazzi  and  Giordano  Bruno,  and  then 
Francis  Bacon  and  Descartes,  about  one  minute  before 
twelve,  began  to  batter  down  the  great  edifice  which 
the  scholastic  doctors  had  reared  from  the  blocks  they 
had  appropriated  from  Aristotle.  They  pleaded  for 
reason  and  denoimced  the  senseless  respect  for  tradi- 
tion. Descartes,  at  the  close  of  his  immortal  treatise 
on  The  Method  of  Seeking  Truth,  says  that  he  is 
writing  in  his  own  native  French  instead  of  the  Latin 
of  his  Jesuit  instructors  because  he  hopes  to  reach  those 
who  use  their  own  good  wits  instead  of  relying  on  old 
books.  A  little  earlier  Lord  Bacon  published  his 
wonderful  Advancement  of  Learning,  also  in  his  own 
mother  tongue,  and  at  the  end  of  his  life  his  Novum  Or- 
ganon,  in  Latin.  Li  both  he  deals  with  what  he  calls 
"the  kingdom  of  man."  Augustine  knew  only  of  a 
kingdom  of  God  and  a  kingdom  of  the  devil.  Lord 
Bacon  was  the  first  to  popularize,  in  his  varied  and 
resourceful  English,  the  promises  of  experimental 
science.    He  says :  — 


THE  SPIRIT  OF  CONSERVATISM  245 

Antiquity  deserveth  that  reverence,  that  men  should  take 
a  stand  thereupon  and  discover  what  is  the  best  way ;  but  when 
the  discovery  is  well  taken,  then  to  make  progression.  And  to 
speak  truly,  Antiquitas  saeculi  juventus  mundi.  These  times 
are  the  ancient  times,  when  the  world  is  ancient,  and  not  those 
which  we  accoimt  ancient  ordine  retrogrado,  by  a  computation 
backward  from  ourselves.  .  .  . 

Another  error  that  hath  also  some  affinity  with  the  former, 
is  the  conceit  that  of  former  opinions  or  sects,  after  variety  and 
examination,  the  best  hath  still  prevailed  and  suppressed  the 
rest ;  so  that  if  a  man  should  begin  the  labor  of  a  new  search, 
he  were  but  like  to  light  up)on  something  formerly  rejected,  and 
by  rejection  brought  into  oblivion :  as  if  the  multitude,  or  the 
wisest  for  the  multitude's  sake,  were  not  ready  to  give  passage 
rather  to  that  which  is  superficial,  than  to  that  which  is  substan- 
tial and  profound ;  for  the  truth  is,  that  time  seemeth  to  be  of 
the  nature  of  a  river  or  stream,  which  carrieth  down  to  us  that 
which  is  light  and  blown  up,  and  sinketh  and  drowneth  that 
which  is  weighty  and  soUd.  .  .  . 

Another  error  hath  proceeded  from  too  great  a  reverence 
and  a  kind  of  adoration  of  the  mind  and  understanding  of  man ; 
by  means  whereof,  men  have  withdrawn  themselves  too  much 
from  the  contemplation  of  nature,  and  the  observations  of  ex- 
perience, and  have  tvmibled  up  and  down  in  their  own  reason 
and  conceits.  Upon  these  intellectualists,  which  are  notwith- 
standing commonly  taken  for  the  most  sublime  and  divine 
philosophers,  Heraclitus  gave  a  just  censure,  saying,  "Men 
sought  truth  in  their  own  Uttle  worlds  and  not  in  the  great  and 
common  world;"  for  they  disdain  to  spell,  and  so  by  degrees 
to  read  in  the  volume  of  God's  works.  .  .  . 

But  the  greatest  error  of  aU  the  rest  is  the  mistaking  or 
misplacing  of  the  last  or  furthest  end  of  knowledge.  For  men 
have  entered  into  a  desire  of  learning  and  knowledge,  sometimes 
upon  a  natural  curiosity  and  inquisitive  appetite;   sometimes 


246  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

to  entertain  their  minds  with  variety  and  delight ;  sometimes 
for  ornament  and  reputation;  and  sometimes  to  enable  them 
to  victory  of  wit  and  contradiction,  and  most  times  for  lucre 
and  profession;  and  seldom  sincerely  to  give  a  true  account  of 
their  gift  of  reason,  to  the  benefit  and  use  of  men ;  as  if  there 
were  sought  in  knowledge  a  couch  whereupon  to  rest  a  search- 
ing and  restless  spirit  ...  or  a  shop  for  profit  and  sale ;  and 
not  a  rich  storehouse  for  the  glory  of  the  Creator  and  the  reUef  of 
man's  estate.^ 

Bacon  thus  undermines  reverence  for  the  past  by 
pointing  out  that  it  rests  on  a  gross  misapprehension. 
Living  before  us,  the  ancients  could  not  be  expected 
to  be  our  peers  in  knowledge  or  experience.  He  would 
have  the  universities  give  up  worshiping  Aristotle  and 
his  commentators,  cease  "tumbling  up  and  down"  in 
their  own  metaphysical  exaltations,  and  turn  to  the 
study  of  real  things  in  the  world  about  them.  The 
reason  for  such  study  should  be,  first  and  foremost, 
the  bright  prospect  of  relieving  man's  estate.  Like  Sir 
Thomas  More,  Bacon  wrote  a  Utopia,  the  New 
Atlantis.  The  central  feature  of  his  ideal  commu- 
nity was  a  national  academy  of  sciences,  a  sort  of 
Carnegie  Listitution,  in  which  all  sorts  of  experiments 
were  carried  on  with  a  view  to  making  discoveries 
designed  to  better  the  people's  lot.  Bacon  has  often 
been  reproached  with  making  no  real  contributions  to 
science.^    The  criticism  is  probably  just,  but  his  r61e 

^  Advancement  of  Learning,  Bk.  I,  Ch.  V,  sections  i-ii,  passim. 
2  For  example  by  Draper,  in  his  History  of  the  ItUdlectual  DevehP' 
ment  of  Europe. 


THE  SPIRIT  OF  CONSERVATISM  247 

was  that  of  a  herald,  as  he  himself  recognized.  He  was 
the  trumpeter  who  amiounced  the  dawn  of  our  own 
day. 

It  was  in  1605  that  the  Advancement  of  Learning 
was  first  published.  And  we  may  safely  say  that  it  is 
scarcely  three  centuries  since  the  idea  of  the  possibility 
of  indefinite  progress  through  man's  own  conscious 
efiforts  first  clearly  emerged  in  the  minds  of  a  very  few 
thoughtful  persons.  And  it  is  to  Francis  Bacon  that 
the  glory  is  due,  as  we  have  said,  of  first  populariz- 
ing this  great  idea  —  the  greatest  single  idea  in  the 
whole  history  of  mankind  in  the  vista  of  possibilities 
which  it  opens  before  us. 

The  idea  of  conscious  progress  was  not  only  essen- 
tially new;  it  could  only  develop  in  an  obviously 
dynamic  social  environment  and  with  the  growth  of 
historic  perspective.  The  Greek  thinkers  did  not  have 
it  at  all  in  its  modem  form,  so  far  as  we  can  judge.  It 
is  true  that  Herodotus  had  a  lively  appreciation  of  the 
general  debt  of  Greek  civilization  to  the  Egyptians, 
and  Plato  now  and  then  refers  to  Egypt,  but  there  is 
no  clear  comprehension  of  just  what  we  call  progress. 
Aristotle  was  keenly  aware  of  the  development  of 
Greek  philosophy  since  the  Ionian  philosophers,  but 
there  is  nothing  to  indicate  that  he  thought  of  mankind 
as  going  on  indefinitely  discovering  new  truth,  and 
he  had  none  of  Lord  Bacon's  interest  in  seeing  the 
results  of  natural  science  applied  to  the  gradual  ame- 
lioration of  the  general  lot  of  mankind.    Lucretius, 


248  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

the  Epicurean  philosopher  of  Cicero's  time,  doubtless 
reflecting  earlier  Greek  speculations,  guessed  that  there 
had  been  a  stone  age,  a  bronze  age,  and  an  iron  age.^ 
But  his  was  no  philosophy  of  progress.  Men  might, 
it  is  true,  understand  the  universe  so  far  as  to  perceive 
that  it  was  the  result  of  a  fortuitous  concourse  of 
atoms,  limited  in  kinds  and  obejdng  certain  fixed  laws. 
But  the  chief  significance  of  this  to  Lucretius  lay  in 
abolishing  all  fear  of  the  gods  and  of  death.  He  did 
not  discover  in  his  mechanistic  universe  any  promise 
of  steady  human  progress.  Indeed,  he  thought  that 
a  degeneration  was  setting  in  which  foreboded  the 
complete  dissolution  of  the  universe  as  we  know  it. 
In  short,  the  Greek  and  Roman  philosophers  would 
have  agreed  with  the  medieval  theologians  in  accepting 
the  stationary  character  of  the  civilization  with  which 
they  were  familiar. 

Augustine  and  his  disciple,  Orosius,  gave  history 
a  new  background,  and  illustrated  God's  dealings 
with  man,  from  the  Garden  of  Eden  to  the  sack  of 
Rome  by  Alaric;  but  they  knew  little  or  nothing  of 
man's  long  history  and  unconscious  progress  in  the 
past,  nor  did  they  anticipate  any  future  improvement, 
for  to  the  ardent  Christian  no  earthly  betterment 

1  In  the  oft-quoted  and  remarkable  lines :  — 

Anna  antiqua  manus,  ungues,  dentesque  fuerunt 
Et  lapides,  et  item  sylvariun  fragmina  rami, 
Posterius  ferri  vis  est  aerisque  reperta ; 
Sed  prior  aeris  erat  quam  ferri  cognitus  usus. 

—  De  rerum  natura,  Bk.  V,  vv.  1281  sqq. 


THE  SPIRIT  OF  CONSERVATISM 


249 


could  compare  with  the  overwhelming  issue  which 
awaited  man  after  death,  when  every  one  entered 
into  eternal  and  unchanging  bliss  or  misery.  Accord- 
ingly, emulation  consisted  at  best,  until  the  opening 
of  the  seventeenth  century,  in  striving  to  reach  stand- 
ards set  by  the  past.  The  mere  age  of  an  institution 
or  a  belief  came  to  be  its  surest  sanction.  The  present 
might  consider  itself  fortunate  if  it  was  at  any  point 
as  good  as  the  past.  Only  with  Giordano  Bruno  and 
Lord  Bacon  did  the  strength  of  authority  and  tradi- 
tion begin  to  be  weakened,  in  spite  of  the  hostility 
and  consistent  opposition  of  those  who  believed  that 
they  were  defending  God-given  arrangements  against 
the  attacks  of  infidels,  freethinkers,  and  rationalists.^ 
The  process  of  weakening  authority  has  been  very 
rapid,  considering  its  novelty  and  its  fundamental  char- 
acter. It  went  on  apace  in  the  eighteenth  century. 
Beccaria,  the  ItaUan  jurist,  who  pleaded  so  eloquently 
for  the  revision  of  the  horrible  criminal  law,  foresaw 
that  the  conservatives  would  urge  that  the  practices 
which  he  sought  to  abolish  were  ratified  by  a  hoary 
past ;  he  begged  them  to  recollect  that  the  past  was 
after  all  only  an  immense  sea  of  errors  from  which 
there  emerged  here  and  there  an  obscure  truth.^    Dur- 

*  This  airsory  treatment  of  a  great  theme,  the  origin  of  the  idea  of 
progress,  may  be  supplemented  by  Delvaille,  J.,  Essai  sur  Vhistoire  de 
I'idee  de  Progres  jusgii^d  la  fin  du  XVIIIieme  Si^le,  1910 ;  Laurent, 
Etudes  sur  Vhistoire  de  Vhumaniti,  1866,  Ch.  XII,  pp.  63  sqq. ;  and 
Flint,  History  of  the  Philosophy  of  History,  pp.  88  sqq. 

*  Beccaria,  An  Essay  on  Crimes  and  Punishments,  1788,  p.  113. 


250  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

ing  the  early  years  of  the  French  Revolution,  and  un- 
der most  discouraging  circumstances,  Condorcet  wrote 
his  famous  treatise  on  the  indefinite  perfectibility 
of  man.  In  it  he  seeks  to  trace  the  steps  which  human- 
ity has  taken  in  the  past  toward  truth  and  happi- 
ness. "Ces  observations,"  he  trusts,  "sur  ce  que 
I'homme  a  ete,  sur  ce  qu'il  est  aujourd'hui,  conduiront 
ensuite  aux  moyens  d'assurer  et  d'accelerer  les  nou- 
veaux  progres  que  sa  nature  lui  permet  d'esperer 
encore.  Tel  est  le  but  de  I'ouvrage  que  j'ai  enterpris, 
et  dont  le  resultat  sera  de  montrer,  par  le  raisonne- 
ment  et  par  les  faits,  qu'il  n'a  ete  marque  aucun  terme 
au  perfectionnement  des  facultes  humaines,  que  la 
perfectibilite  de  I'homme  est  reellement  indefinie;  que 
les  progres  de  cette  perfectibilite,  desormais  independ- 
ent de  toute  puissance  qui  voudrait  I'arreter,  n'ont 
d'autre  terme  que  la  duree  du  globe  ou  la  nature  nous 
a  jet6s."i 

These  genial  speculations  tending  to  turn  men's  eyes 
toward  the  future  rather  than  the  past  were  tremen- 
dously reenforced  by  the  scientific  discoveries  of  the 
nineteenth  century.  These  proved,  first,  that  man 
was  learning  a  great  deal  more  than  any  one  had  ever 
known  before  about  the  world  and  his  place  in  it. 
Secondly,  he  was  applying  his  knowledge  in  such  a 
way  as  to  make  older  methods  of  manufacture  and 
transportation  and  communication  appear  very  crude 

^  "  Esquisse  d'un  tableau  historique  des  progr^  de  I'esprit  hiunain," 
1797,  P-  4. 


THE  SPIRIT  OF  CONSERVATISM  251 

and  antiquated.  Lastly,  Darwin,  Lyell,  Boucher  de 
Perthes,  Huxley,  G.  de  Mortillet,  Haeckel,  and  the 
rest  established  the  fact  that  long  before  historic 
times  man  had  proved  himself  capable  of  the  most 
startling  progress.  He  had  not  only  made  his  way 
from  savagery  to  civilization,  but  from  the  estate  of 
an  animal  to  that  of  a  man.  Not  only  had  his  an- 
cestors gone  on  all  fours  and  hved  as  the  beasts  of 
the  field,  but  their  remoter  ancestors  had  mayhap 
lived  in  the  sea  and,  as  Darwin  conjectures,  resembled 
a  so-called  Ascidian  larva,  a  tadpole-like  creature  not 
yet  supplied  with  an  unmistakable  backbone.  Roger 
Bacon,  Francis  Bacon,  Descartes,  Beccaria,  Condorcet, 
—  these  and  many  like  them  stoutly  maintained  that 
man  could  learn  indefinitely  more  than  any  of  his 
predecessors  had  known,  and  could  better  his  estate  in- 
definitely by  the  use  of  this  knowledge  and  the  deser- 
tion of  ancient  prejudices  and  habits.  The  nineteenth 
century  proved  conclusively  that  he  had  been  learning 
and  had  been  bettering  himself  for  hundreds  of  thou- 
sands of  years.  But  all  this  earlier  progress  had  been 
unconscious.  For  the  first  time,  close  upon  our  own 
day,  progress  became  an  ideal  consciously  proclaimed 
and  sought.  So,  whatever  the  progress  of  man  has  been 
during  the  twelve  hours  which  we  assign  to  him  since 
he  became  man,  it  was  only  at  about  one  minute  to 
twelve  that  he  came  to  wish  to  progress,  and  still  more 
recently  that  he  came  to  see  that  he  can  voluntarily  pro- 
gress, and  that  he  has  progressed.    This  appears  to 


252  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

me  to  be  the  most  impressive  message  that  history 
has  to  give  us,  and  the  most  vital  in  the  light  that  it 
casts  on  the  conduct  of  life. 


II 

If  it  be  conceded  that  what  we  rather  vaguely  and 
provisionally  call  social  betterment  is  coming  to  be 
regarded  by  large  numbers  of  thoughtful  persons  as 
the  chief  interest  in  this  game  of  life,  does  not  the 
supreme  value  of  history  lie  for  us  to-day  in  the  sug- 
gestions that  it  may  give  us  of  what  may  be  caUed 
the  technique  of  progress,  and  ought  not  those  phases 
of  the  past  especially  to  engross  our  attention  which 
bear  on  this  essential  point  ?  History  has  been  regu- 
larly invoked,  to  substantiate  the  claims  of  the 
conservative,  but  has  hitherto  usually  been  neglected 
by  the  radical,^  or  impatiently  repudiated  as  the 
chosen  weapon  of  his  enemy.  The  radical  has  not  yet 
perceived  the  overwhelming  value  to  him  of  a  real 
understanding  of  the  past.  It  is  his  weapon  by  right, 
and  he  should  wrest  it  from  the  hand  of  the  conserva- 
tive. It  has  received  a  far  keener  edge  during  the 
last  century,  and  it  is  the  chief  end  of  this  essay  to 
indicate  how  it  can  be  used  with  the  most  decisive 
efifect  on  the  conservative. 

So  far  as  I  know,  no  satisfactory  analysis  has  ever 

*  The  Marxian  socialist,  of  course,  uses  his  version  of  the  past  in 
support  of  his  plan  of  social  amelioration. 


THE  SPIRIT  OF  CONSERVATISM  253 

been  made  of  the  conservative  and  radical  tempera- 
ments. It  is  commonly  assumed  that  every  boy  and 
girl  is  born  into  one  or  the  other  party,  and  doubtless 
as  mere  animals  we  differ  greatly  in  our  bravery, 
energy,  and  hopefulness.  But  nurture  is  now  seen 
to  be  all  that  separates  even  the  most  uncompromis- 
ing radical  from  a  life  far  lower  than  that  of  any 
savage  that  exists  on  the  earth  at  the  present  time. 
Even  the  recently  extinct  race  of  Tasmanians,  still 
in  a  paleolithic  stage  of  development,  represented 
achievements  which  it  took  man  long  ages  to  ac- 
cumulate. The  literally  uneducated  European  even 
to-day  could  neither  frame  a  sentence  nor  sharpen  a 
stick  with  a  shell.  A  great  part,  then,  of  all  that  goes 
to  make  up  the  conservative  or  radical  may  be  deemed 
the  result  of  education  in  the  broadest  sense  of  that 
term,  including  everything  that  he  has  got  from  asso- 
ciating since  infancy  with  civilized  companions.  I 
think  that  the  modem  anthropologist  and  psychologist 
would  agree  on  this  point;  at  least,  every  one  who 
allows  his  mind  to  play  freely  over  the  question  must 
concede  that  a  great  part  of  what  has  been  mistaken 
for  nature  is  really  nurture,  direct  and  indirect,  con- 
scious or,  more  commonly,  wholly  unconscious. 

Now  it  has  been  the  constant  objection  urged  by 
the  conservative  against  any  reform  of  which  he  dis- 
approved that  it  involved  a  change  of  human  nature. 
He  has  flattered  himself  that  he  knew  the  chief  char- 
acteristics of  humanity  and  that,  since  it  was  hope- 


254  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

less  to  alter  any  of  these,  a  change  which  seemed  to 
imply  such  an  alteration  was  obviously  impracticable. 
This  argument  was  long  ago  met  by  Montaigne,  who 
declared  that  one  who  viewed  Mother  Nature  in  her 
full  majesty  and  luster  might  perceive  so  general  and 
so  constant  a  variety  that  any  individual  and  even  the 
whole  kingdom  in  which  he  happened  to  live  must 
seem  but  a  pin's  point  in  comparison.^  But  there  is 
a  wholly  new  argument  now  available.  Whether  the 
zoologists  are  quite  right  or  no  in  denying  the  possi- 
bility of  the  hereditary  transmission  of  acquired 
traits,  there  is  no  reason  to  think  that  one  particle  of 
culture  ever  gets  into  the  blood  of  our  human  species ; 
it  must  either  be  transmitted  by  imitation  or  inculca- 
tion, or  be  lost,  as  Gabriel  Tarde  has  made  clear.  We 
doubtless  inherit  the  aptitudes  of  our  parents,  grand- 
parents, and  remoter  ancestors ;  but  any  actual  exer- 
cise that  they  may  have  made  of  the  faculties  which  we 
share  with  them  cannot  influence  us  except  by  example 
or  emulation.  Those  things  that  the  radical  would 
alter  and  the  conservative  defend  are  therefore  not  traits 
of  human  nature  hut  artificial  achievements  of  human 
nurture.  Accordingly,  the  anthropologist  and  his- 
torian can  rule  out  this  fundamental  conservative 
appeal  to  human  nature  by  showing  that  the  most 
extraordinary  variety  has  existed  and  still  exists  in 
the  habits,  institutions,  and  feelings  of  various  groups 
of  mankind ;  and  the  student  familiar  with  the  chief 
»  "On  Education,"  Essays,  Bk.  I,  Ch.  XXV. 


THE  SPIRIT  OF  CONSERVATISM  25$ 

results  of  embryology  will  see  that  the  conservative 
has  constantly  mistaken  the  artificially  acquired  and 
hereditarily  non-transmissible  for  constant  and  unal- 
terable elements  in  our  native  outfit.  And,  indeed,  it 
may  be  asked,  if  it  has  proved  possible  to  alter  an  in- 
vertebrate tadpole-Hke  creature  Hving  in  the  sea  into 
an  ape-like  animal  sleeping  in  a  tree,  and  to  transform 
the  ape-Uke  animal  into  an  ingenious  flint-chipping 
artist,  able  to  paint  pictures  of  bison  and  deer  on  the 
walls  of  a  cave,  and  to  derive  from  the  flint  chipper 
of  the  stone  age  a  Plato  able  to  tell  a  most  edifying 
tale  about  a  cave  full  of  conservatives,  what  becomes 
of  the  argument  for  the  fixity  of  human  nature  in  any 
important  sense  ? 

While  it  is  then  highly  imscientific  and  imhistorical 
to  consider  the  way  in  which  men  behave  and  feel 
at  any  particular  time  as  exhibiting  the  normal  and 
immutable  principles  of  human  nature,  history  and 
anthropology  nevertheless  concur  in  proving  that 
each  new  generation  is  indebted  to  the  previous  gen- 
eration for  very  nearly  all  that  it  is  and  has.  This 
is  true  of  even  the  most  rapidly  progressing  societies, 
and  there  is  reason  to  suppose  that  a  group  of  mankind 
could  live  indefinitely  adhering  to  an  unchanged 
scheme  of  civilization  so  long  as  they  were  undis- 
turbed and  their  environment  remained  constant. 
We  have  seen  how  very  recently  the  idea  that  progress 
is  possible  has  dawned  upon  a  small  portion  of  man- 
kind.    The  alterations  which  any  people  can  effect 


256  THE  NEW  fflSTORY 

within  a  half  century  in  its  prevailing  ideas  and  insti- 
tutions, and  in  the  range  and  character  of  its  gen- 
erally diffused  knowledge,  are  necessarily  slight  when 
compared  with  the  vast  heritage  which  has  gradually 
been  accumulating  during  hundreds  of  thousands 
of  years.  In  order  to  make  the  nature  and  variety 
of  our  abject  dependence  on  the  past  clear,  we  have 
only  to  consider  our  language,  our  laws,  our  political 
and  social  institutions,  our  knowledge  and  education, 
our  view  of  this  world  and  the  next,  our  tastes  and  the 
means  of  gratifying  them.  On  every  hand  the  past 
dominates  and  controls  us,  for  the  most  part  uncon- 
sciously and  without  protest  on  our  part.  We  are 
in  the  main  its  willing  adherents.  The  imagination 
of  the  most  radically-minded  cannot  transcend  any 
great  part  of  the  ideas  and  customs  transmitted  to 
him.  When  once  we  grasp  this  truth,  we  shall,  accord- 
ing to  our  mood,  hiraibly  congratulate  ourselves  that, 
poor  pygmies  that  we  are,  we  are  permitted  to  stand 
on  the  giant's  shoulders  and  enjoy  an  outlook  that 
would  be  quite  hidden  from  us  if  we  had  to  trust  to 
our  own  short  legs ;  or  we  may  resentfully  chafe  at  our 
bonds  and,  like  Prometheus,  vainly  strive  to  wrest 
ourselves  from  the  rock  of  the  past,  in  our  eagerness 
to  bring  relief  to  the  suffering  children  of  men. 

Es  erben  sich  Gesetz'  und  Rechte 
Wie  eine  ew'ge  Krankheit  fort. 

In  any  case,  whether  we  bless  or  curse  the  past,  we 
are  inevitably  its  offspring,  and  it  makes  us  its  own 


THE  SPIRIT  OF  CONSERVATISM  257 

long  before  we  realize  it.  It  is,  indeed,  almost  all  that 
we  can  have.  The  most  frantic  of  us  must  follow 
the  beaten  path;  we  are  like  a  squirrel  in  his  revolv- 
ing cage. 

There  is  no  space  here  to  discuss  the  general  rela- 
tion of  history  to  the  causes  and  technique  of  progress, 
but  a  word  may  be  said  of  the  effect  which  our  modem 
outlook  should  have  on  our  estimate  of  the  conserva- 
tive mood.  Mr.  John  Morley  has  given  an  unpleas- 
ant but  not  inaccurate  sketch  of  the  conservative, 
"with  his  inexhaustible  patience  of  abuses  that  only 
torment  others;  his  apologetic  word  for  beUefs  that 
may  not  be  so  precisely  true  as  one  might  wish,  and 
institutions  that  are  not  altogether  so  useful  as  some 
might  think  possible ;  his  cordiality  towards  progress 
and  improvement  in  a  general  way,  and  his  coldness 
or  antipathy  to  each  progressive  proposal  in  particular ; 
his  pygmy  hope  that  Uf  e  will  one  day  become  somewhat 
better,  punily  shivering  by  the  side  of  his  gigantic 
conviction  that  it  might  well  be  infinitely  worse." 
How  numerous  and  how  respectable  is  still  this  class  ! 
It  is  made  up  of  clergymen,  lawyers,  teachers,  editors, 
and  successful  men  of  affairs.  Doubtless  some  of 
them  are  nervous  and  apologetic,  and  try  to  find 
reasons  to  disguise  their  general  opposition  to  change 
by  taking  credit  for  improvements  to  which  they  con- 
tribute nothing,  or  by  forwarding  some  minor  changes 
which  exhaust  their  powers  of  imagination  and 
innovation.    But  how  rarely  does  one  of  them  fail, 


258  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

when  he  addresses  the  young,  to  utter  some  warning, 
some  praise  of  the  past,  some  discouragement  to 
effort  and  the  onward  struggle !  The  conservative 
is  a  perfectly  explicable  and  inevitable  product  of 
that  long,  long  period  before  man  woke  up  to  the 
possibility  of  conscious  betterment.  He  still  justifies 
existing  conditions  and  ideas  by  the  standards  of  the 
past  rather  than  by  those  of  the  present  or  future. 
He  neither  vividly  realizes  how  mightily  things  have 
advanced  in  times  gone  by,  nor  has  he  the  imagination 
to  see  how  easily  they  could  be  indefinitely  bettered, 
if  the  temperament  which  he  represents  could  cease 
to  be  artificially  fostered. 

Should  the  conservative  be  roused  to  defend  him- 
self, having  been  driven  from  the  protection  which  his 
discredited  conception  of  "human  nature"  formerly 
offered,  he  may  ask  peevishly,  "what  does  progress 
mean  anyway  ?  "  But  no  one  who  realizes  the  relative 
barbarism  of  our  whole  civilization,  which  contains, 
on  a  fair  appraisal,  so  little  to  cheer  us  except  promises 
for  the  future,  will  have  the  patience  to  formulate 
any  general  definition  of  progress  when  the  most 
bewildering  opportunities  for  betterment  summon 
us  on  every  side.  What  can  the  conservative  point 
to  that  is  not  susceptible  of  improvement  ? 

There  is  one  more  solace,  perhaps  the  last,  for  the 
hard-pressed  conservative.  He  may  heartily  agree 
that  much  improvement  has  taken  place  and  claim 
that  he  views  with  deep  satisfaction  all  deliberate 


THE  SPIRIT  OF   CONSERVATISM  259 

and  decorous  progress,  but  ascribe  to  himself  the 
modest  and  perhaps  ungrateful  function  of  acting  as 
a  brake  which  prevents  the  chariot  of  progress  from 
rushing  headlong  down  a  decline.  But  is  there  any 
reason  to  suppose  that  any  brake  is  necessary  ?  Have 
fiery  radicals  ever  got  possession  of  the  reins  and 
actually  driven  for  a  time  at  a  breakneck  speed? 
The  conservative"  would  find  it  extremely  difficult 
to  cite  historic  examples,  but  doubtless  the  Reign  of 
Terror  would  occur  to  him  as  an  instance.  This 
certainly  has  more  plausibility  than  any  other  alleged 
example  in  the  whole  recorded  history  of  mankind. 
But  Camille  Desmoulins,  one  of  its  most  amiable 
victims,  threw  the  blame  of  the  whole  affair,  with 
much  sound  reasoning,  on  the  precious  conservatives 
themselves.  And  I  think  that  all  scholars  would  agree 
that  the  incapable  and  traitorous  Louis  XVI  and  his 
runaway  nobles,  supported  by  the  threats  of  the  mon- 
archs  of  Prussia  and  Austria,  were  at  the  bottom  of 
the  whole  matter.  In  any  case,  as  Desmouhns  urges, 
the  blood  shed  in  the  cause  of  liberty  was  as  nothing 
to  that  which  had  been  spilt  by  kings  and  prelates 
in  maintaining  their  dominion  and  satisfying  their 
ambitions.^ 

So  even  this  favorite  instance  of  o'er-rapid  change 

will  scarcely  bear  impartial  scrutiny,  and  we  may 

safely  assert  that  so  far  the  chariot  of  progress  has 

always  been  toiling  up  a  steep  incline  and  that  the 

*  "Vieux  Cordelier,"  No.  3,  December,  1793. 


26o  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

restraining  brake  of  the  conservatives  has  been  worse 
than  useless.  Maeterlinck  exhorts  us  never  to  fear 
that  we  shall  be  drawn  too  far  or  too  rapidly;  and 
there  is  certainly  nothing  in  the  past  or  present  to 
justify  this  fear.  On  the  contrary,  as  he  says,  "There 
are  men  enough  about  us  whose  exclusive  duty,  whose 
precise  mission,  is  to  extinguish  the  fires  that  we 
kindle."  "At  every  crossway  on  the  road  that  leads 
to  the  future,  each  progressive  spirit  is  opposed  by  a 
thousand  men  appointed  to  guard  the  past.  Let  us 
have  no  fear  lest  the  fairest  towers  of  former  days  be 
sufficiently  defended.  The  least  that  the  most  timid 
among  us  can  do  is  not  to  add  to  the  immense  dead- 
weight which  nature  drags  along." 

History,  the  whole  history  of  man  and  of  the  organic 
universe,  seems  now  to  put  the  conservative  arguments 
to  shame.  Indeed  it  seems  to  do  more ;  it  seems  to 
justify  the  mystic  confidence  in  the  future  suggested 
in  Maeterlinck's  Our  Social  Duty.  Perhaps,  as  he 
believes,  an  excess  of  radicalism  is  essential  to  the 
equihbrium  of  life.  "Let  us  not  say  to  ourselves," 
he  urges,  "that  the  best  truth  always  Hes  in  modera- 
tion, in  the  decent  average.  This  would  perhaps  be  so 
if  the  majority  of  men  did  not  think  on  a  much  lower 
plane  than  is  needful.  That  is  why  it  behooves  others 
to  think  and  hope  on  a  higher  plane  than  seems  reason- 
able. The  average,  the  decent  moderation  of  to-day, 
will  be  the  least  human  of  things  to-morrow.  At  the 
time  of  the  Spanish  Inquisition,  the  opinion  of  good 


THE  SPIRIT  OF  CONSERVATISM  261 

sense  and  of  the  just  medium  was  certainly  that  people 
ought  not  to  burn  too  large  a  number  of  heretics; 
extreme  and  unreasonable  opinion  obviously  demanded 
that  they  should  burn  none  at  all." 

Here  again  we  may  turn  to  the  past  for  its  authenti- 
cating testimony.  A  society  without  slaves  would 
have  been  almost  incomprehensible  to  Plato  and  Aris- 
totle. To  the  latter  slavery  was  an  inevitable  corollary 
of  human  society.  To  Innocent  III  a  church  without 
graft  was  a  hopeless  ideal.  To  Richelieu  a  foreign 
service  without  bribery  was  a  myth.  To  Beccaria  a 
criminal  procedure  without  torture,  and  courts  without 
corrupt  judges,  were  a  dream.  It  would  have  seemed 
preposterous  enough  to  Franklin  to  forecast  a  time 
when  a  Philadelphian  could  converse  in  his  home  with 
friends  far  beyond  the  Mississippi,  or  to  assert  that 
one  day  letters  would  be  carried  to  all  parts  of  the  earth 
for  so  small  a  sum  that  even  the  poorest  would  not 
find  the  expense  an  obstacle  to  communication.  But 
all  these  hopeless,  preposterous  dreams  have  come  to 
pass  and  that  in  a  Httle  more  than  a  hundred  years. 

From  forwarding  these  achievements  the  conserva- 
tive has  hitherto  held  himself  aloof,  whether  from  tem- 
perament, ignorance,  or  despair.  But  let  us  exonerate 
him,  for  he  knew  no  better.  He  had  not  the  wit  to 
see  that  he  was  a  vestige  of  a  long,  unenlightened 
epoch.  But  history  would  seem  to  show  that  this 
period  of  exemption  from  service  is  now  at  an  end.  It 
is  plain  that  his  theory  that  human  nature  cannot  be 


262  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

altered  is  exploded,  as  well  as  his  belief  that  a  fractious 
world  needs  him  to  apply  the  brakes. 

The  conservative  has,  in  short,  been  victimized 
by  a  misunderstood  past.  Hitherto  the  radical  has 
appealed  to  the  future,  but  now  he  can  confidently  rest 
his  case  on  past  achievement  and  current  success. 
He  can  point  to  what  has  been  done,  he  can  cite  what 
is  being  done,  he  can  perceive  as  never  before  what 
remains  to  be  done,  and,  lastly,  he  begins  to  see,  as 
never  before,  how  it  will  get  done.  It  has  been  the 
chief  business  of  this  essay  to  suggest  what  has  been 
done.  If  there  were  time,  I  might  try  to  show  that 
progress  in  knowledge  and  its  appHcation  to  the  allevia- 
tion of  man's  estate  is  more  rapid  now  than  ever  be- 
fore. But  this  scarcely  needs  formal  proof;  it  is  so 
obvious.  A  few  years  ago  an  eminent  French  lit- 
terateur, Brunetiere,  declared  science  bankrupt.  This 
was  on  the  eve  of  the  discoveries  in  radioactivity 
which  have  opened  up  great  vistas  of  possible  human 
readjustments  if  we  could  but  learn  to  control  and 
utilize  the  inexhaustible  sources  of  power  that  lie 
within  the  atom.  It  was  on  the  eve  of  the  discovery 
of  the  functions  of  the  white  blood  corpuscles,  which 
clears  the  way  for  indefinite  advance  in  medicine. 
Only  a  poor  discouraged  man  of  letters  could  think 
for  a  moment  that  science  was  bankrupt.  No  one 
entitled  to  an  opinion  on  the  subject  believes  that 
we  have  made  more  than  a  beginning  in  penetrating 
the  secrets  of  the  organic  and  inorganic  world. 


THE  SPIRIT  OF  CONSERVATISM  263 

In  the  fourth  canto  of  the  Inferno  Dante  describes 
the  confines  of  hell.  Here  he  heard  sighs  which  made 
the  eternal  air  to  tremble.  These  came  of  the  woe  felt 
by  multitudes,  which  were  many  and  great,  of  infants 
and  of  women  and  men  who,  although  they  had  lived 
guiltless  lives,  were  condemned  for  being  bom  before 
the  true  religion  had  been  revealed.  They  lived  with- 
out hope.  But  in  the  midst  of  the  gloom  he  beheld  a 
fire  that  conquered  a  hemisphere  of  darkness.  Here,  in 
a  place  open,  luminous,  and  high,  people  with  eyes 
slow  and  grave,  of  great  authority  in  their  looks,  sat 
on  the  greensward,  speaking  seldom  and  with  soft 
voices.  These  were  the  ancient  philosophers,  states- 
men, miUtary  heroes,  and  men  of  letters.  Neither 
sad  nor  glad,  they  held  high  discourse,  heedless  of  the 
wails  of  infants,  imconscious  of  the  horrors  of  hell 
which  boiled  beneath  them.  They  knew  nothing  of 
the  mountain  of  purgatorial  progress  on  the  other  side 
of  the  earth,  which  others  were  climbing,  and  heaven 
was  forever  inaccessible  to  them.  Yet  why  should 
they  regret  it  —  were  they  not  already  in  the  only 
heaven  they  were  fit  for  ? 

As  for  accomplishing  the  great  reforms  that  demand 
our  united  efforts  —  the  aboUtion  of  poverty  and  dis- 
ease and  war,  and  the  promotion  of  happy  and  ra- 
tional lives  —  the  task  would  seem  hopeless  enough 
were  it  not  for  the  considerations  which  have  been 
recalled  above.  Until  very  recently  the  leaders  of 
men  have  looked  backward  for  their  standards  and 


264  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

ideals.  The  intellectual  ancestors  of  the  conservative 
extend  back  in  an  unbroken  line  to  the  very  begin- 
ning of  human  history.  The  reformer  who  appeals 
to  the  future  is  a  recent  upstart.  He  belongs  to  the 
last  half  minute  of  our  historical  reckoning.  His 
family  is  a  new  one,  and  its  members  have  often  seemed 
very  black  sheep  to  the  good  old  family  of  conserva- 
tives who  have  found  no  names  too  terrible  to  apply 
to  the  Anthony  Collinses,  the  Voltaircs  and  Tom 
Paines,  who  now  seem  so  innocent  and  commonplace 
in  most  of  their  teachings.  But  it  is  clear  enough  to- 
day that  the  conscious  reformer  who  appeals  to  the 
future  is  the  final  product  of  a  progressive  order  of 
things.  While  the  conservative  sullenly  opposed  what 
were  in  Roger  Bacon's  time  called  "suspicious  novel- 
ties," and  condemned  changes  either  as  wicked  or 
impracticable,  he  was  himself  being  gradually  drawn 
along  in  a  process  of  insensible  betterment  in  which 
he  refused  consciously  to  participate.  Even  those  of 
us  who  have  little  taste  for  mysticism  have  to  recognize 
a  mysterious  unconscious  impulse  which  appears  to 
be  a  concomitant  of  natural  order.  It  would  seem  as 
if  this  impulse  has  always  been  unsettling  the  exist- 
ing conditions  and  pushing  forward,  groping  after 
something  more  elaborate  and  intricate  than  what 
already  existed.  This  vital  impulse,  elan  vital,  as 
Bergson  calls  it,  represents  the  inherent  radicalism  of 
nature  herself.  This  power  that  makes  for  experi- 
mental readjustment,  —  for  adventure  in  the  broadest 


THE  SPIRIT  OF  CONSERVATISM  265 

sense  of  the  term,  —  is  no  longer  a  conception  con- 
fined to  poets  and  dreamers,  but  must  be  reckoned 
with  by  the  most  exacting  historian  and  the  hardest- 
headed  man  of  science.  We  are  only  just  coming  to 
realize  that  we  can  cooperate  with  and  direct  this  in- 
nate force  of  change  which  has  'so  long  been  silently 
operating,  in  spite  of  the  respectable  lethargy,  indif- 
ference, and  even-  protests  of  man  himself,  the  most 
educable  of  all  its  creatures. 

At  last,  perhaps,  the  long-disputed  sin  against  the 
Holy  Ghost  has  been  found ;  it  may  be  the  refusal 
to  cooperate  with  the  vital  principle  of  betterment. 
History  would  seem,  in  short,  to  condemn  the  prin- 
ciple of  conservatism  as  a  hopeless  and  wicked  anach- 
ronism. 

If  what  has  been  said  above  is  true,  or  any  consid- 
erable part  of  it,  is  not  almost  our  whole  education  at 
fault?  We  make  no  consistent  effort  to  cultivate  a 
progressive  spirit  in  our  boys  and  girls.  They  are  not 
made  to  realize  the  responsibility  that  rests  upon  them 
—  the  exhilaration  that  comes  from  ever  looking  and 
pressing  forward.  They  are  still  so  largely  nurtured 
upon  the  abstract  and  the  classical  that  we  scarcely 
yet  dare  to  bring  education  into  relation  with  life. 
The  history  they  are  taught  brings  few  or  none  of  the 
lessons  the  past  has  to  offer.  They  are  reared  with 
too  much  respect  for  the  past,  too  Uttle  confidence 
for  the  future.  Does  not  education  become  in  this 
way  a  mighty  barrier  cast  across  the  way  of  progress, 


266  THE  NEW  HISTORY 

rather  than  a  guidepost  to  betterment  ?  Would  not 
most  of  those  in  charge  of  the  education  of  our  youth 
tremble  before  the  possibihty  of  having  them  realize 
fully  what  has  been  hinted  in  this  essay?  What 
would  happen  if  the  teachers  in  our  schools  and  col- 
leges, our  theological  seminaries  and  law  schools, 
should  make  it  their  business  to  emphasize  the  tem- 
porary and  provisional  character  of  the  instruction 
that  they  offer,  and  urge  the  students  to  transcend 
it  as  fast  as  a  progressive  world  permitted?  The 
humorous  nature  of  such  a  suggestion  shows  how 
far  we  are  still  from  any  general  realization  and 
acceptance  of  the  great  lesson  of  history. 

"Let  us,"  to  quote  MaeterUnck  once  more,  "think 
of  the  great  invisible  ship  that  carries  our  human 
destinies  upon  eternity.  Like  the  vessels  of  our  con- 
fined oceans,  she  has  her  sails  and  her  ballast.  The 
fear  that  she  may  pitch  or  roll  on  leaving  the  road- 
stead is  no  reason  for  increasing  the  weight  of  the 
ballast  by  stowing  the  fair  white  sails  in  the  depths 
of  the  hold.  They  were  not  woven  to  molder  side  by 
side  with  cobblestones  in  the  dark.  Ballast  exists 
everywhere ;  all  the  pebbles  of  the  harbor,  all  the  sand 
of  the  beach,  will  serve  for  that.  But  sails  are  rare 
and  precious  things ;  their  place  is  not  in  the  murk  of 
the  well,  but  amid  the  Ught  of  the  tall  masts,  where  they 
will  collect  the  winds  of  space." 


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